The day comes slowly
by planet p
Summary: Very, very AU; a sequel to Mangoes in the wintertime.
1. Chapter 1

**The Day Comes Slowly** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.

* * *

_Four years later_

Whitney and Kit Jamison Russell sat beside their aunt, Emily, whilst their mother, Missy, sat across the table with Emily's daughter, Farfalla. Farfalla was five (and blind), and would soon be starting school; her older brother, Snow, was ten, but closer to eleven. Whitney and Kit were three and, obviously, twins. According to their parents, Far didn't have to go to school, she could stay home and learn all of the things she needed to learn at school at home. When it was their turn for school, Whitney and Kit had decided that they didn't want to go to some scary, unfamiliar building either, they wanted to stay home as well.

Emily and Missy weren't talking, in fact, nobody at their table was talking. Emily was eating a biscuit; Whitney and Kit had decided that eating was Emily's all-time favourite thing to do, though she didn't seem to put a whole heap of weight on, which they thought was odd; women on television were forever going on and on about 'snacking' and the fact that it was bad and made people fat.

Of course, when they asked their mother, she'd said that snacking was only bad when people were always snacking, and didn't eat real meals, and when they were only ever snacking on things that had a lot of 'questionable' ingredients, such as artificial colourings and flavourings, excessive amounts of sugar or salt, or excessive dairy products. When they'd mentioned that they'd been led to believe that milk was good for you, their mother had quickly told them that too much milk was not _good_ for adults. Mystery solved, then, they had supposed. After all, they had to concede that Emily wasn't always eating biscuits, it was mostly fruit (when she wasn't throwing it at their father for what she called his 'intelligent' comments).

Today, they'd all gone out for some extended family time. Their grandmothers were running late, however, which, they thought, might have been a contributing factor to the silence at the table. Margaret, their father's mother, liked to talk, and Harmony, their mother's mother, liked talking with her. They had been friends for a long time, something which Whitney and Kit suspected their mother and Emily had not been, and were not.

"Can we get juice, mom," Kit finally spoke up, drawing his mother's attention from across the table.

"To drink?" she asked, as though suspecting ulterior motives.

"No, mom, to run the lawnmower later, when dad gets back from work and _finally_ gets around to mowing the garden," Kit replied. Their mother had been asking him to do so all week, it was one of the bigger current affairs topics in their household, along with, There most certainly will not be any dogs, or cats, or small furry, scaly or otherwise unclassified creatures of any kind brought into this house!

Whitney snickered, and added, "Yes, mom, to drink. We're thirsty. I mean, Kit and I are thirsty."

"You know our favourite," the twins said at the same time.

Beside them, Emily suddenly sat up straighter. "Why don't I shout the kids this time," she suggested. "You guys are always paying, and I feel kind of bad for that."

Missy sighed, and nodded; _fine, okay._

"Can I get you anything whilst I'm about it?" Emily asked.

"No, I'm fine, thank you."

"Farfalla, would you like anything, sweetheart?"

"For you to stop calling me sweetheart," Far replied darkly.

"I see."

"Can't say as I reciprocate, mom. Drop the 'sweetheart' – I'm five, not _two_!"

"I don't like this attitude of yours, young lady," Emily told her. "I hope this isn't coming from your brother-"

"No, mom, we are independent beings!" Far snapped. "Just, get the twins their juice before they dehydrate to death, or something."

"'Dehydrate to death'?" Kit asked, highly suspicious. It sounded like something out of a bad sci-fi flick.

"Real people die of dehydration, Kit," his cousin informed him. "Every day. What's more, you little blighter, dehydration is bad for you. It doesn't just kill you right away, it takes its time making things in your body go haywire and then… that's what kills you!"

"So?" Kit replied. "Who even buys their wires from farms and stuff anyway?"

Whitney laughed raucously; apparently, she was the only one. Across the table, her mom didn't look impressed.

Far crossed her arms over her chest, saying nothing.

Missy's cell phone trilled out their father's ring tone; she grabbed her phone and pressed the button to answer. "I'm listening," she answered.

_I'm not_, Whitney mouthed to her twin.

Kit smiled; she smiled back.

Emily returned with their juices, handing them each their favourite: apple for Whitney, and orange and mango for Kit. "Here you go kids," she whispered, as she passed them the cold drinks, and took her seat.

Missy was on the phone: the table went back to silence save for Missy's occasional bursts of speech when she interrupted something Jarod had said, or answered a question he'd asked.

Emily sipped her strawberry milkshake she'd left at the table when she'd left to get the twins their juices, only half empty, and looked outside onto the street. It was a nice, bright day outside; she supposed it was the sort of day that was good for a walk, that was, of course, of her mother and Harmony turned up. They could all go for a walk; like a family.

She watched the people on the street, walking to or from various places unknowable to her, and the cars passing by. Outside the café, a teenaged boy stood on the pavement. She supposed he was reading a flyer that had been tacked up inside the shop's front window for passer's by to have a look at. He looked about eighteen, maybe seventeen, and she wondered, for a moment, why he wasn't in school; perhaps he'd dropped out, or he was truant. She noticed he wore glasses and thought, _Wouldn't it be nice if Farfalla only had to wear glasses._ But, of course, that wasn't the case.

Returning from her thoughts, she noticed that the boy had moved on, perhaps to read another flyer in another shopfront, and wondered if he was looking for a job. Well, that was probably it, she thought. It was a nicer thought than that that he'd skipped school.

* * *

"First of all, we come bearing apologies for our lateness," Margaret announced, appearing at their table, "and, second of all, we have gifts!" She held up an assortment of different shopping bags.

Harmony leaned down to whisper in Missy's ear, "I bought you a sweater. I really couldn't say 'no.' It'll go perfectly with your eyes."

"You didn't have to do that," Missy replied, knowing that Jarod would approve, and feeling just a bit better for her falsely light tone: she wasn't anywhere near as okay with Harmony buying her 'motherly' gifts as she let on. Still, she liked to keep familial relations sailing smoothly, and she preferred to set a good example for her children than a bad one, or one where she lost her cool and snapped at Harmony that, no matter what, she wasn't her mother! If she couldn't _remember_ being her mom, then she jolly well wasn't!

"It'll look fabulous on you, I'm sure!" Harmony answered brightly.

"Thank you," Missy said, watching Margaret hand out stuffed toys to the twins, and a toy parrot to Farfalla, "I'll try it on first thing when I get home."

"What is it?" Farfalla immediately questioned.

"It's a parrot, sweetie. A bright, colourful bird."

Far snorted. "Colourful! Just what I wanted!"

Margaret sounded slightly put out, and apologetic, "Oh, well…"

"I'm not biting your head off, nan," Far told her. "It's soft. It's cool. I can still hug it and stuff, until I'm old enough for a boyfriend – preferably one with a colourful personality." She laughed; Emily quickly laughed along with her, the good mom. Nobody else did.

Margaret and Harmony sat down at the table; Harmony taking the vacant seat beside Missy and Margaret pulling a chair across from one of the neighbouring tables.

Emily let her smile disappear. Apparently there wasn't going to be any gifts for her. Apparently some people were still mad at her for fraternising with the enemy. (Which was apparently okay for Jarod, but not for her. Not that she had anything against Missy, but, for goodness sakes, it had been years ago! She never once talked about him, or asked Missy anything about him – she tried her best to make an effort to be friendly to every single one of the 'nice, young' (and conveniently well-to-do) men her mom introduced her to. What was she doing wrong?)

"Is mine a…?" Kit looked at his twin, who made large _Ah, your guess is as good as mine, mate_ eyes in his direction.

"It's a gorilla, sweetie," Margaret told him.

Whitney cracked up, though she wasn't even sure she knew what a gorilla was. It looked a bit like a monkey, to her. "Mine's easy; it's a seal," she reported to her twin.

"Why couldn't we both have seals?" Kit asked, glancing across the table at Margaret. Was she trying to do something here, like subtly tell him he liked things like gorillas and Whitney liked things like seals, like subtly tell him that Whitney and he might have been twins, but they weren't those sort of twins! (The sort of twins who finished each other's sentences, or liked the same things; who always knew when the other was down and needed a hug!)

"Well, there weren't two seals, sweetie, there was only one, or else I would have gotten you both the same," she answered easily.

"You're not going to separate us!" he told her loudly.

Sitting beside him, Emily jumped, but, across the table, Margaret merely frowned.

"What are you talking about, sweetie?" she asked, putting on her very best confused tone.

He stared at his mother. Margaret knew what he was talking about, alright! He was talking about her trying to turn Whitney and he into their mother and her brother all over again! Well he wasn't going to fall for that! Whitney was his sister, and he loved her _like a sister_; Margaret, or anybody else who took a liking to the same notion she was entertaining, wasn't going to mess with that!

Whitney stared at him, unsure whether to laugh or frown.

He dropped his shoulders, realising that this time, Whitney was in the dark, and, as much as he wanted them to share everything, that this wasn't something that one shared; he wasn't trying to pit Whitney against her grandmother. "Why did I have to get a monkey," he groused. "Monkeys don't even live in the same places that seals do. They can't even be friends, Whit."

"They're just toys," she replied. "I say they can so be friends!"

"Of course they can be friends," Missy backed her up. Such a fuss over something of such small significance! It was just a toy, honestly.

When Kit dared to look at her, Margaret was already looking elsewhere. "Sweetie-"

Emily got to her feet immediately. "I'll get you two coffees, yeah?"

"Thank you, sweetie," Margaret chimed sweetly, but Kit had a feeling that if anyone was fooled by her tone of voice, it was because they wanted to be.

"Have you noticed how she's always bossing Emily around?" he asked Whitney quietly, leaning in so that the others wouldn't hear.

Whitney shook her head at him a little. "She doesn't boss Em around," she told him as though implying that he was absolutely horrid just to say so but she was going easy on him because he'd gotten the crappy gorilla when he'd wanted a seal, too.

He didn't say anything; he'd thought that she had noticed, but maybe it was only him. He felt like throwing his stuffed gorilla across the room, but he didn't. He'd only freak everyone out.

* * *

Missy suppressed a heavy sigh. The horror show was finally over; she was home, with the kids in one piece, and her sanity in enough of a semblance of cohesion that she wasn't going to complain. Striding into the lounge room, she dropped the shopping bag onto the couch and sunk down onto the cushions beside it, listening to the sound of the front door closing after one of the twins.

After they'd left the café, Emily had suggested they take a walk around town and they'd spent an hour looking in shop windows. It might have been tolerable, she thought, if Margaret hadn't spent the entire time insinuating that Emily was putting on too much weight and wouldn't look any good in any of the items she thought looked nice in the shop windows. She, after all, hadn't thought that anything Emily had suggested looked nice wouldn't look exactly that on her; in fact, she _didn't_ think that Emily was too heavy, she thought that Margaret was being unduly harsh on her. Of course, she knew exactly the reason for Margaret's anger at her daughter; Jarod had explained it to her early on. She hadn't thought Margaret's behaviour towards her daughter was quite fair, even then, and she still didn't.

But she never said anything. She didn't want to rile things up and have them turn on her, suddenly, and see _her_ as the enemy.

She understood that her brother had been anything but stupid, and that, if he'd wanted to, he could be very, very convincingly normal, or just different enough that Emily might have fallen into the trap of trusting him and thinking that he cared for her. She was a Pretender, just as Jarod was, and though she'd never been trained anywhere near as extensively in her abilities as Jarod had, she knew that her brother probably had. Maybe not from as early an age as Jarod, in fact, she was sure of that, but he had been trained.

Faced with someone like that, Emily had been completely out of her depth. As far as she was concerned, Margaret had absolutely no right to keep on hounding her daughter over that sort of rubbish from the past. It was over now, it was done with, why couldn't she just give it up and let Emily get over it and work it out in her own way.

Opening her eyes, which she hadn't realised she'd closed, she spied Kit watching her from in front of the couch. He was holding a heavy-looking volume from the dictionary set they kept in the lounge, on the bottom shelf of one of the bookshelves. "Does 'gorilla' start with a 'g'?" he asked her.

She smiled, and nodded.

He shuffled closer to the couch and set down beside her, bringing the book with him.

"Where's your sister?" she asked, snuggling up closer to him.

"Playing with the neighbour's cat outside. She saw him through the window."

She shot a look out the front window; Whitney was sitting on the grass outside, patting a white cat that she thought she'd seen around, so maybe it did belong to the neighbours.

"And why aren't you outside with her?" she asked.

"He always runs away when I come over," Kit replied. "I don't think he likes me very much." He frowned. "Can you read me the part about the gorillas, mom?"

She smiled. "Of course I can, baby."


	2. Chapter 2

**So this chapter's really bad, just so you're prepared.**

* * *

The young woman turned to face him when he approached, her expression bland.

"Can I have my nametag back, Gwen?" Glen McAvoy asked in a not-so-happy tone, hoping that she'd finally _get_ that it _so_ wasn't funny!

"Oops!" Gwen replied right back, in exactly the same so-not-happy tone.

He crossed his arms. "Gwen, give me my nametag back."

"Well, you know I would, Glen, but I don't have it," she told him.

"Right, then it was the pixies who took it, was it?"

She laughed.

"Tinkerbelle!"

"Tinkerbelle's a fairy," Gwen informed him, amused.

"Gwen! I need my nametag!"

"So? I don't have it! Go look for it, then!"

He reached for the pocket of her pants where she'd stowed it earlier, saying, "It's in your pocket-"

With a loud squeal, Gwen leapt back from him, her eyes going wide, wide, wide.

"Gwen, I want my nametag! Will you just give it to me already! I know you have it."

"Were you just trying to _touch_ me?" she demanded in high pitch voice.

"No, Gwen," he replied blandly, "not at all; you're not my type."

She stared at him in horror. "Oh my God, you fucking pervert!"

"I'm the pervert?" he asked calmly. "Oh, because – when was it? – last week, at… Drew's party, I was totally the one asking my little brother's best friend-"

Gwen's hand shot up to cover her mouth. In a quiet voice, she whispered, "Alright, I'll give it back…"

"Yeah? For _real_, Gwen?"

She nodded, her voice shaking when she said, "For real… I… didn't think anyone had seen… Were you… there… or did you… hear about it from someone…?"

He rolled his eyes. "Can I have my nametag back now?"

With a trembling hand, Gwen dug the nametag out of her pocket and handed it to him.

"Seriously, Gwen, it's up to Naveen and you to decide if that sort of relationship is appropriate. He's 14, not four. Though I will say one thing, I don't really think he's on the level where he's thinking about a relationship in the same way as you, Gwen. He's a kid, and he's never had any cause to think about anyone but himself, he doesn't care about companionship or _emotions_ or intellect – not yet, anyway. It takes time, Gwen; just you watch he's not the one taking you for a ride. It'll be you getting into hot water over it, if it does turn out that way."

He turned away from her and walked back along the aisle in the direction of his register, pinning his nametag back to his shirt.

* * *

"Why'd you do that to yourself?" Gwen asked, appearing behind him in the coffee room. He was on break; apparently, so was she.

Turning around to face her, he asked, "Do what to myself, Gwen?" knowing full well she was talking about the cuts on his wrists; what else?

"Try to…" she lowered her voice, "kill yourself?"

"I don't actually see how that's any of your business, Gwen," he replied, stepping past her and walking over to the table where he took a seat – on the table.

"You're not supposed to sit on the table," she told him in a hiss.

"So?"

She walked over and sat down beside him. "Are you going to tell me then?"

He put his glass of water down on the table beside him and turned to look her in the eyes. "I was six; I don't remember, Gwen."

She frowned.

"Ask anyone," he went on, "and they'll tell you that I was some dumb shit six-year-old. That, I do remember. My parents were never too pleased about my reports, let me tell you. I reckon I had some dumb, stupid selfish reason, but you know what, I don't even care right now."

"Why don't you care?"

"Because I'm not six anymore!"

"Do you hate little kids?"

He sighed heavily. "No, Gwen, I don't hate kids – I just don't think I was ever… really good at it…"

"At being a kid?"

"Yeah."

She made a face. "Nobody's good or bad at being a kid, they just are," she told him.

He tilted his head to one side. "Well, yeah, maybe…"

"Yeah, maybe!"

He shook his head. "I don't know why we're even talking about this. If you're thinking about killing yourself, let me just assure you, I'm probably the worst person to talk to if you're hoping I'll try and talk you out of it!"

"What?" she asked.

"I suck, Gwen! Especially at talking people out of dumb shit plans!"

"No you don't suck," she told him, "you're just young, and you haven't found anything worthwhile in life yet. Wait until you meet the right girl-"

"Okay, if that's something your dad told you-"

"My dad's cool – and I love him! We talk about loads of stuff! He never freaks or-"

"Well, that's lovely, hon, but I gotta say, my father and I, we didn't really get along."

"That's your dad's loss, Glen! It doesn't mean all dads are like your dad – or that they're all _liars_. You've got to move past that prejudice, Glen, or it's shit like that that'll come back and fuck everything up for you just when you think everything's going more than fine, when it's all perfect – bam, the shit comes back with a vengeance!"

"That's nice, Gwen. Love the pep talk! How old do you think I am?"

"16?"

"I'm 19, Gwen!"

"Oops! Maybe you're 19, physically, but you sure as heck don't seem like it, mentally!"

"No shit, we mental defectives don't have feelings!"

Gwen stared at him. "That's what I'm talking about, Glen! They're not called _mental defectives_, the term is 'challenged.'"

"The term is some lovely fuckin' pharmaceutical company out to make-" He rolled his eyes. "Ignore me, Gwen. I hate the world."

"No you don't. What were you going to say?"

"Nothin', Gwen, nothin' at all."

She looked away from him. "How can you be stupid? I thought all people who wore glasses were, like, super smart!"

"Well, I don't know where you got your information, Gwen, but that's just not true. I was some stupid kid, I can tell you. And, hey, I still am!" He laughed.

* * *

"Hi. How are you today?" Glen asked the woman on the other side of the register. She seemed to be staring at the four packets of biscuits she'd put on the conveyor with ill ease.

"I'm good," she told him quickly, snapping her eyes away from the biscuits and to his face. For a moment, she hardly even moved, then she leant in a bit closer, frowning. "Are your eyes different colours?" she asked.

"Mmm-hmm."

"Sorry, um, my manners could do with a decent polish, they're not the best-"

"I'd say that they're just fine, ma'am."

"Oh, well… well, how are you?"

"I'm fine, ma'am."

She nodded. "Then, that's good to hear." She quickly shifted her eyes to the display showing the running total and began digging around in her purse.

* * *

"You wanna hear something crazy, Gwen?" he asked, walking into the coffee room and over to the sink, where Gwen was standing running her hand under the cold water tap. Apparently she'd cut it on something because it was bleeding.

"Shoot," she told him.

"So maybe I chose the wrong descriptor," he replied, and reached out to take her hand out from under the tap.

"It was this dumb jar; apparently you're not the only stupid one!"

"You're not stupid, Gwen. You just weren't thinking. That doesn't mean you can't. You know what I really want right now?"

She looked away for a moment in a gesture of bewilderment. "No."

He moved her hand back under the tap. "Biscuits." He let go of her hand and walked out of the room.

She leant in closer to the tap and stared at her hand. It had stopped bleeding, for some reason. It wasn't even hurting. She took it out from under the tap and almost laughed (or fainted). The cut wasn't there anymore, it had just… gone!

* * *

She didn't get to talk to him until it was knockoff time, but she made sure to catch up with him, then. She'd even bought a packet of biscuits. She hoped he didn't mind the type she'd gotten.

"How did you do that, Glen?" she asked, before he ran away from her, or something. "That thing with my hand?"

"Shit happens, Gwen. I'm kinda over the biscuit thing right now."

She frowned, and shrugged. "Have you… done stuff like that before? I mean, you seemed pretty cool about it, at the time."

"Yes, Gwen, I have, and it's not… it's not like you think, Gwen. I can't just… I don't choose when it works and when it doesn't, not… this, me! Not Glen!"

"I totally don't think you're a witch," she told him, just in case he'd been thinking that was what she thought. "It's cool with me, Glen. I won't tell."

He turned away from her. "I hope not, Gwen, because I'm not what you think I am."

* * *

"I saw this boy at the supermarket today, and for some reason, he just looked really familiar," Emily told her, as she was pulling leaves off the lettuce for a salad.

"Worryingly familiar, or just neighbourhood familiar?" Missy asked, sipping her glass of wine.

"I don't know."

"So what's his name?"

Emily left the lettuce on the breadboard and walked away, returned a few moments later with a shopping docket which she handed to Missy.

"Glen? Sounds like a country singer's name to me," Missy told her.

"Well I don't know any country singers," Emily replied.

"Nor me, I'm afraid to say. Maybe you should introduce me to this boy?"

"Do you think so?"

"Sure, why not? What harm can it do?"

Emily laughed humourlessly. "Hhh! Depends on who's watching and what they're thinking!"

"I very much doubt that Margaret has the stamina nor the inclination to follow you all through town and then to the shopping centre!"

Emily shook her head.

Missy shrugged and poured her a glass of wine. "Have some wine. Don't take everything so hard, Em. You've got Jarod and I, and you've got the kids!"

"I know," Emily sighed.

Missy handed her the glass of wine, holding it out for her until she took it, and watched her take a sip. "See. It's all okay. Just relax."

The wineglass slipped out of Emily's hand and smashed loudly on the kitchen floor. "Oh my God!"

"What?" Missy prompted. "What? Shit! Did you figure out who the kid is?"

Emily stepped back from the shattered glass and the red wine lying in a spattered pool on the kitchen floor. She shook her head. In a whisper, she said, "He reminds me of your brother."

Missy frowned. "What, Ethan?"

"Not Ethan," Emily whispered.

Missy laughed. "What are you thinking, Em? You think he's a clone?"

Emily shook her head, remembering the cut in his hand when he'd handed her her change. It was just like the one Lyle had had.

"It can't be him, Em. He's dead. Trust me."

"How do you know?"

"Because this is some shit that I would just know, twin shit, Emily."

"How do you know they didn't…" she cast around wildly, "do something!"

"There's nothing to do if you're shot it the head, Em."

Emily stepped back from her. "What about Harmony?"

"Look, Em! He's fucked! Harmony got lucky! It was just luck! The crazy fucking son-of-a-bitch who… _Healed_ her, he's fuckin' dead, Em! Long dead! And he sure as Hell wasn't our father! And, you know what, he couldn't Heal himself so I don't see it mattering if he _was_ or _wasn't_ our _father_!"

"What if there wasn't just one of them?"

Missy stared at her. She thumped her glass of wine down at the table.

"I was sick," Emily whispered.

"What?"

"I was sick," Emily repeated. "I- I went there because I was sick. The… doctors said I had… maybe a couple of weeks. I was sick."

"You were Healed?"

"I don't know!"

Missy walked over to her and put her arms around her. "Hey, look, you don't owe them anything, Em. Not anything! _Especially_ not after the shit they put you through!"

"Who was the Healer?" Emily whispered, close to her ear.

"Raines," Missy said finally. "You see, he wasn't just a traitor to his children – _so-called_ children – he was a traitor to his own kind, as well!"

"Why would they let him kill himself?"

"They didn't know: the simple answer. They never knew."

"But you did."

"He was my dad, you know, that's what he said, more lies, if you ask me, but I knew some shit about him. That was one of the things I knew: liar, traitor, psychopath! Sounds like someone I knew!" She laughed.

"Yeah, you know, Lyle could have been his fucking son – if he hadn't been such a dumb fucking shit! As it stands, I don't think he was! If he had inherited an ounce of Raines's Healing ability, he'd sure as Hell not have gotten around killing all those girls – it's the sort of shit you just don't do as a self-respecting Healer, and he was all about, _Oh, I am just so fucking self-respecting – in fact, motherfuckers, I'm the only one I fucking respect, so do me a favour and _go to Hell_!_ As we both know! Raines was mad, but not half as mad as Lyle, as much as I'm sure the realisation pained him: _Ah, shit, outdone again!_" She laughed again.

"The only other option I see as anywhere near reasonable, and, you know, this one just makes it worse… but I don't see that lunatic as having so much self-control! Not ever! If he'd been a Reaper, and Reapers can Heal themselves, then he wouldn't have just… you know, I know it doesn't seem at all appropriate to say, but those girls would have been in a Hell of a sorrier state, trust me! To which I add, I never saw any fucking telekinesis! When they're in their… other form, they have a certain amount of telekinesis, and, not forgetting, kinda sharp teeth, and nice little claws. It's noticeable, Em. Oh, trust me, it's noticeable.

"I've met Reapers, and I know – I _know_ – Lyle wasn't one. He wasn't a Reaper, and he wasn't a Healer – which equals _dead_!"

"What if it was… another Healer?" Emily suggested shakily.

"The wonderful, fantastical _misterioso_ Healer!" Missy laughed. "That's enough of that for one evening, I think! I can't take any more of this Healer shit!"

"I really think it's him, Missy," Emily told her in a low voice.

"Then I'll just have to pay him a nice little visit and _waste_ the fucker! 'Til he's dead!"

"What if I don't want you to?"

"Why the fuck wouldn't you want me to, Em?"

"… I… I don't know…"

* * *

The kids were off to Margaret and Harmony's for some quality time with their grandmothers, and Missy had decided she'd check out this Glen Not-a-country-singer Emily had mentioned meeting at the supermarket before she'd gotten ridiculously, spectacularly drunk on red wine.

Jarod was away with his dad and the boys, Ethan and Mo, and Missy didn't really have anything else to do, seeing as she didn't have the kids, so she figured it would probably be a nice thing to do for her sister-in-law. In real life, as far as she'd ever been given cause to believe, people _did not_ just get up and walk away from a gunshot wound to the head. As for Reapers, even for them, it was a tricky subject. A bullet to the head usually killed a Reaper, if it got that far, so even if her creep brother had been a Reaper, hmm… _She_ certainly wasn't buying it!

And she wasn't going to tell Jarod anything until she'd decided she _had_ something to tell him.

She popped by the Enquiries desk at the supermarket and asked to speak to Glen. When CRYSTAL offered to call him up, she quickly told her that she'd much prefer she just point him out, if he was on at one of the registers.

With a shrug, Crystal did so, and left her to attend to a customer who was buying cigarettes, which Missy refrained from thinking about. So far, she hadn't gotten any _Your brother isn't really dead, the creep was having one over you all – again!_ vibes, so she was playing it hopeful. Hopefully, he really was dead, hopefully, she wouldn't have to take up smoking again!

She picked out a magazine on her way over to the register Crystal had pointed out, and got in line, all the while, thinking, _Emily said 'boy,' if he was a Reaper for real, he'd just have Healed himself, he wouldn't have regenerated – I bet it's nothing._

It wasn't until the line ahead of her had cleared that she realised how much she'd been hoping she was right.

Which, of course, she wasn't.

"I'll be with you in just a moment, ma'am," 'Glen' told her; he was talking to someone on the phone.

She refrained from leaping over the desk and killing him on the spot, which, she realised, wasn't exactly legal.

"I would, yeah. Why not?" He looked away to the line behind her. "I have about… Damn it! Okay, in a while."

Missy widened her eyes at him when he finally put the phone down, _About time, kiddo!_

"Excuse me," he called down the line, "this register's closing shortly, if a couple of you wouldn't mind just going over to Four. Thank you." He frowned, and returned his attention to Missy and her one magazine. Smiling, she leaned over and picked out a couple of chocolate bars.

"Break?"

"Sorta…" He winced, and rephrased, "Something like that, ma'am."

She nodded, letting it show on her face how unimpressed she was that he couldn't even take a few customers more before his break. "I think I know your mother."

"Do you?" he asked. "I've gotta say, I never knew her myself, so I can't say as to either way after her character, madam."

She took out her card. "EFTPOS?"

He pointed to the EFTPOS machine, with a frown.

She smiled falsely. "So who's on Four?" she asked, once she'd swiped her card and was busy with the buttons she had to press.

"Maria, probably," Glen replied and reached over to press a button for her.

She made a face. "I can do it!"

"Sure, whatever!"

"So who's Maria?"

"She's just Maria, I guess."

"She's not your girlfriend?"

"No! Could you pay attention to what you're pressing."

"I am paying attention, excuse me very much!"

"Hhh! Right!"

"I'm perfectly capable of multitasking!"

He rolled his eyes. "Whatever."

"You're a very rude boy, has anyone ever told you that?"

"More than you'd know." He leaned over and pointed to register Four, for those waiting on her to hurry it up with the EFTPOS transaction.

"Shit! You know what, I think I must have used my husband's PIN." She laughed. "So many numbers to remember, one gets flustered by it all."

"I'm sure, madam," Glen agreed.

"Oh! There! That was the right one! Thank goodness!"

Glen shook his head. "Why are you asking all these questions, anyway, if I might be so rude? Though, I gotta say, I prefer the term 'forward.' What's with all the questions, lady? It's seriously totally uncool right now!"

"Glen who?" she replied, putting her card away in her purse and taking her shopping bag, which he was holding out for her.

"None of your business, I'd say," he told her.

She smiled. "Well, that's not a very nice thing to say to your sister, is it now?"

"Sister?" He rolled his eyes again and frowned.

She nodded. "Sister."

"So? It's not like you've been in my life ever!"

She laughed. "Huh! You little fuck, you listen to me!" She reached over to grab the front of his clothes but was unsuccessful when he stepped back sharply.

"Okay!" he rambled. "I don't know who you are! I think I remember the woman from… yesterday. She's… your friend, right. I think I remember your friend! But I don't remember you! I don't know who you are!"

"How do you know my friend?" she spat in a low growl.

"I think we were involved… romantically."

Missy laughed. "You're a piece of shit, you know that! Involved!"

"We weren't?" Glen asked, confused. "I was sure that we had been."

She just laughed.

He frowned, and met her gaze. "Look, I have to go. There's a problem with the computers over…" He shook his head. "I know stuff about computers. I have to go."

"Oh, by all means," she laughed, "go! Why don't you fucking kill yourself whilst you're at it, psycho!" With that, she stalked away.

* * *

Emily was up and about and making coffee by the time she got back to the house. She walked into the kitchen and dropped the magazine and the chocolate bars on the kitchen table carelessly.

Emily turned away from the electric kettle, which she'd been watching with only a mild interest, and looked at the items newly arrived on the table. "Oh, is one of those for me?" she asked.

Missy nodded. "Sure. Go ahead."

"Are you okay?" Emily asked, taking one of the chocolate bars. "Thanks for the chocolate bar. I'm making coffee. Would you like one, too?"

Missy nodded again. "Em, I'm sorry. I didn't want it to be him-"

Emily choked, and dropped the chocolate bar she'd been trying to open. She quickly bent down to pick it up again.

Missy laughed. "He says he doesn't _remember_!" she sniped sarcastically. "_Me or you!_" She glared. "Oh, oops, no, what he actually said was that he thought the two of you had been _romantically involved_!" She laughed again, her pitch rising a notch.

Emily frowned, and put the bar down on the table. "Oh. I guess I was kinda hoping the same thing you were. What should we do now?"

"Think."

The kettle clicked off.

"Have a coffee," Missy added.

* * *

"Let's say it was some other Healer," Missy said, sipping her coffee. "Look, I never got the slightest Healer feeling out of anyone there – to be honest, not even Raines, in his later years. I think even he believed the ability had left him after he'd shot Catherine."

"But he Healed her, didn't he?"

"But maybe that's not the sort of thing you're supposed to Heal," Missy suggested. "Maybe it… made something go wrong, or just stop working."

"How would it stop working?"

"I don't know. Maybe it damaged him somehow. The point is, Lyle's not a Healer – God, no! – so I just don't see who it was who could have Healed him, and, mind you, if, _if_ it was the Center, then what's he doing here?"

"Maybe he's supposed to bring us back in, but he's waiting for Dad and Jarod and Ethan and Mo?"

Missy scowled. "He had fucking better not be playing that game, mark my words, Em! I _will_ fucking waste him! He's fucked this family over enough times!"

"But it's possible, isn't it? I mean, they have other branches. Now that Blue Cove's gone, maybe a Healer from another branch Healed him and now he's working for them?" She shook her head. "How do you even know he _did_ shoot himself?"

Missy sighed. "Because I felt it, Emily. We're twins. We still are that. I know I never was big on the idea, but all I can say is that it has to be true, because I definitely felt something."

Emily stared at her in horror. "What if they just wanted you to think he was dead? What if they found your real twin and killed them, just so you'd think it was Lyle who was dead?"

Missy blinked. "What?"

"I mean, if you didn't think he was your twin…"

"Too much, Em."

"It's the Center!"

"No, that is too much!" She scowled again. "And it's 'he.' My twin's not a woman."

"I just-"

"Fuck it!"

"I didn't-"

"I know you're not trying to fuck things up for me, Em! Would you stop with the it's-my-fault/blame-me all the time! Your mom has no idea what she's talking about, and, for the fucking record, she has no right saying the shit she does about you!"

"She doesn't say anything about me," Emily defended her mother.

Missy nodded. "Yeah, she really doesn't! She mightn't say it out loud, but we all know she means it, Em!"

Emily frowned, hurt.

"Look, fuck! Just don't say shit about my 'real' twin okay!" Missy told her, trying hard to sound apologetic. "You know you're right, Em. I never believed that fucking creep was my twin, but I gave up, in the end, and just said, _What the fuck! He's dead, anyway!_ Do you get what I'm saying?" – Emily nodded, from across the table. – "But I can't hear that my _real_ fucking twin is actually dead – because of me, because of some fucked up shit that has to do with me, Em!"

"Do you think he's telling the truth about not remembering?" Emily asked quietly.

"Like I said, he better fucking be! How much do you not want me to waste him, Em, cos I need you to tell me right now!"

Emily didn't say anything, she just looked at the table.

* * *

"So, I saw you arguing with that woman," Gwen informed him, falling into step beside him as he left the office. "Who was she?"

"We weren't arguing, Gwen, we were discussing," he replied. "And as to who she is, or was, I don't see how that concerns you."

"Is she your girlfriend?" Gwen teased.

"Whatever," he replied; he didn't care what she thought, frankly.

Gwen laughed. "I'm joking, Pogo. I kinda thought maybe she was your mom; you do look kinda alike."

He froze and turned to face her. "No we don't!"

"Yes, you do," she replied.

"Bullshit!"

"You have the same complexion, the same colour hair-" Gwen started to list off.

"That's a load of rubbish, Gwen. In the first place, loads of people have similar hair colour. Fuck, with the amount of people in the world! And, in the second place, we _don't_ have the same complexion. She's loads paler than me!"

"Not loads," Gwen told him. "Just a little bit."

He shook his head. "Bullshit."

"Is that your new favourite word, Glen? How come you had to see Gavin?"

"The computer wasn't working."

"Gavin thinks he's sooo good, but, I mean, the only thing he is is sooo computer-challenged."

Glen laughed; and she didn't know what she was talking about, either.

"I was only trying to cheer you up," she told him.

"Well don't!" he snapped, and walked away from her.

"Why not?" she called after him. "I like you!"

He stopped and turned around. "Stop it, Gwen," he told her seriously. "No you don't like me. Everybody who likes me ends up fucked up!"

"So maybe I won't," she replied, with a shrug. "Maybe I'll get lucky."

"Maybe you will," he snapped. "And luck has nothing to do with it, Gwen. I'm fucked up – and if you want to associate with me too often, you're gonna end up the same way! Just drop it, Gwen! Nobody deserves that – but you least of all! Just stop talking to me; don't follow me around; you don't even know my name!"

"Yes, I do," Gwen protested. "How can I not know your name?"

"How?" he asked, in a way that suddenly struck her as threatening, and stepped closer to her so that she felt compelled to step back. He smiled. "See! See, you do get it! You're not a stupid girl, Gwen. Stop being stupid! You have a life – so maybe it's kinda not as good as you'd thought, maybe it downright sucks, but it's yours, and you're still alive! Hold onto that, Gwen! Hold tight to that! And stay away from me!" He turned away from her and walked off.

And she just let him.

* * *

"Maria?"

"Yeah, Jenna?"

"It's Gwen."

"Yeah, sure."

"Do you… Do you think Glen's weird? I mean, have you talked to him? Like, a lot?"

Maria frowned. "Who's Glen?"

"Aisle nine," Gwen reminded her.

"Right, sure, yes – creepy! Creepy eyes! Why?" She shook her head, waiting for Gwen's answer.

"He told me to stay away from him," she replied.

"Then do it, girl! Don't get mixed up with that sort! Just do like he says and stay away from him," she put a hand on Gwen's arm, "yeah?"

Gwen frowned, and nodded. "Yeah."

Maria nodded too. "See. No, you're doing okay. I reckon we're gonna be good friends, you and I, Gwen. You ain't gotta worry about that creepy boy no more, you got me and I got you." She laughed. "Don't take it so serious, no?"

"No…" Gwen echoed. Maybe Maria and she could be friends…


	3. Chapter 3

Maria shoved him against the wall. "You stay the fuck away from my friend, you freak! And if I ever catch you scaring her again, or even hear about that shit, you're dead meat!"

Glen smiled. "Sure, Maria, whatever you say," he replied pleasantly.

She glared at him darkly. "I mean what I fuckin' say, you little fuck!"

"I believe you, Maria, no worries," he told her, nodding.

With a last glare, she pushed away from the wall and stormed away.

He watched her go with a smile. So Maria was a Reaper; he'd have to take more notice of her in future. He hadn't got the sense that she was attached to anyone like T-Corp, so maybe her parents or another relative had taught her a thing or two about controlling herself; that still didn't mean he could look the other way and it would all be okay. He'd still have to watch her.

Uncle and aunt, parents are dead; mother's sister and her husband. He stepped away from the wall, thinking to himself, _Alright, alright, give it a rest._ Car accident, just that, just an accident; not manufactured by anyone intentionally: just an accident. _Stop it. Now! Right now!_ She was _so_ hurt!

He stalked off, heading for the exit and outside. No fresh air, but just… just away from Maria and her hurt over her dead parents. It wasn't any of his business, and he didn't want it to be! What the fuck was wrong with him that he always did shit like this, that he couldn't leave be!

He sat down outside, near the Dumpsters, and thought about the thing his 'sister' had said about her friend and he. She was his sister, apparently. They were twins. They had another brother, half-brother, according to her, full brother, according to him. He was out of town; he wasn't a topic they'd ever brought up in each other's company, from what he could tell, and if so, he certainly wasn't a comfortable topic. They hadn't been the sort of twins who'd shared everything. As he'd already known, they had grown up apart. Apparently, they'd never really gotten over that. He had a feeling, more than just a strong suspicion, that that was more to do with him, and that it had been quite intentional. He was still figuring out all the whys, but, as they invariably did, they would all come back, eventually.

So, his sister's friend and he; he hadn't gotten anything from her when they'd met at the supermarket, what did that mean? He'd just… remembered her. And apparently, he'd remembered wrong.

Why was that? he wondered.

_Sydney__._

_Oh, that's nice._

Well, it wasn't exactly nice; it was their father's name. He frowned. It would be nice if he had more than just a name to go o-

Your father knew him; knows him.

He stood up. That was exactly the kind of shit he didn't want to know! As if it should be a comforting thought, that his father and adoptive father know each other – when his adoptive father was a lunatic!

So not comforting!

Well, we're mad, too; didn't you listen to our sister? Sydney would rather trust a lunatic than you. Now, isn't that comforting?

He laughed.

Oh, that was! (No, that was sarcasm.)

It wasn't helping being outside, and he probably had to be back on the register; if he didn't want to be fired, he'd have to get back inside and make it right now.

He wondered if he'd see his sister's friend again, or if she would change supermarkets just to avoid him. There was nothing wrong with wondering something like that, after all, and even if he did think she looked alright, he didn't know a thing about her, and they'd hardly even spoken; even so, there was nothing wrong with him thinking she was a nice looking person, but it was hardly as though they were going to shack up.

_Think about something else_, he told himself._ And _not_ Sydney!_

* * *

"Maybe… maybe I should try to find out…" Emily suggested, finally deciding that she was going to eat that chocolate bar.

Missy's expression hardened. "No way, Emily! No fucking way!"

"But you said it yourself, Missy, he thought we were an item – and I would know if he was lying! I- I'm a Mediator! That's what he said… before… That's what he meant, even if he didn't say it!"

"Bollocks!"

"I have to try!"

Missy shook her head. "Do you know how to use a gun?"

Emily stared at her. "No! I said before that I'm not going near guns again-"

"Well, you lied!" She got to her feet swiftly. "If you're going anywhere near that lunatic, you're going to take a gun!"

"And what do I say when he finds out I have it?"

"What the fuck, you say you're a single woman, out on your own, and you just don't trust the scummy element that's been putting themselves out in the open these days!"

"What, like I'm scared of getting mugged?"

"Yes, Em. Or killed!"

Emily shook her head. "I'm not scared of getting killed by some mugger!"

"Well maybe you should be, because shit happens, Em! It happens all the time!"

Emily frowned at her. "I know that, but it doesn't happen here."

"It can happen anywhere, Em. And the point isn't that you're shaking in your boots, it's that he believes that you have a valid reason for having a gun, if he finds out that you have one."

Emily sighed heavily. "I thought I might wear something… nice…"

"So put it in your handbag, just keep it on you," Missy replied. "Nobody questions women accessorising, except to compliment them or make comments on their taste or superficiality."

Emily shrugged. "If that's okay with you…"

"I'm not your mom, Em, and I'm not about to ring her up and to fill her in in painstaking detail on what you're wearing today!"

"Okay, I'll just be doing that, then."

Missy waved a hand. "Do."

* * *

"Where did you get those tiny shorts?" Missy demanded, when she saw what she was wearing, and laughed.

"Supré, I think."

"I need to get some, they're cute. Do you think Jarod likes tiny shorts?"

"I haven't asked him. I suppose he would, if you were wearing them."

"If he was here to _see_ me wearing them!" Missy mock lamented. "Oh, absent husband, where are you!" She laughed again, but quickly sobered. "Remember to take the gun. Don't leave it in the car, keep it on you. I don't trust him!"

"I'll remember," Emily assured her, though she had been planning on doing just that; on just leaving her handbag with the gun in it in the car.

"Okay, stick to the speed limits."

"I always do," Emily replied, and headed for the front door. She wondered if she should have worn a skirt instead, or maybe a dress.

* * *

She did leave the gun in the car, but she didn't think she'd be needing it in the shopping mall anyway, and how good would it look if, opening her handbag to take out her purse to pay for her strawberry frozen ice drink, she accidentally dropped her bag and the gun fell out. _Don't worry, everyone, it's not real – I'm an actress! I'm acting… a gun-toting… something, something, something… who likes… guns! For her personal safety, of course! Space… alien?_ Or if someone just saw it, like the young woman leaning over to take her coins? Or if, forgetting that she had the gun, or wanting to go into one of the stores, she was asked to show her bag to security?

She'd taken her purse out of her handbag, and left the bag in the car, and was now sitting in the food court, sipping her frozen strawberry drink, wondering why on Earth she'd gotten a _frozen_ drink in the first place.

It was making her cold.

She reminded herself that she needed to shave her arms – she looked like she'd just turned into a werewolf – and went on sipping her drink. She wasn't blonde, and her skin wasn't particularly pale. People always noticed and thought, _Eww._ (Well, in any case, _she_ had noticed and thought, _Er, kinda ew. And guess what, now everyone will know I was either standing in a freezer somewhere, or drinking a cold drink, and, seeing as I'm not blue, it's probably gonna strike them as the latter._)

She frowned. She didn't even know why she was thinking about things that didn't matter, but maybe it was because she was nervous; it was almost lunchtime, and she was sitting at a table in the food court outside the supermarket, waiting for someone who, to be honest, had tried to kill her once.

_Classy_, she thought. She was just classy, she was sure that would be his assessment of the situation when he saw her, too.

* * *

She was just thinking about getting herself a muffin and a salad when she spotted him walking in her direction and leapt up out of her chair, deciding that the purpose of her visit would be to apologise for her friend, who'd told her about what she'd said, and, obviously, it wasn't exactly the sort of thing she supposed a person should say to their brother, blah, blah, blah.

She was still working on making the blah, blah, blah sound convincing and credible. _Channel the reporter_, she reminded herself of what Missy had told her. _If you could do it then, you can do it now!_

"Hello!"

Crap, she sounded like a teenager who didn't know who to talk to a boy she'd been wanting to talk to for _ages_ except to do a super girly voice and hope he didn't pay so much attention to what she was actually saying. A bad first sign of things to come, she decided.

The second bad sign was probably the way he looked her up and down and then decided what was needed – what was _appropriate_ – was a disconcerted _Is this woman all there?_ frown. "The weather must have turned out better than…" He shook his head. "Is this a regular thing with you? Are you a fan of… whoever that monkey is on _Babar_?"

"I came to apologise for my friend. I don't know what _Babar_ is, and frankly, there's no need for you to look at me that way!" Emily told him hotly.

"I'm not looking at you!" he said, then, obviously realising that actually, he was looking at her – it was rude not to look at the person you were talking to, after all – he quickly said, "I am looking at you, but not- not the way you're insinuating I am, I assure you!"

"I wasn't insinuating!" Emily told him.

"No, of course not," he replied.

"What's that supposed to mean!" she snapped. Well, cheerful or what, they were right back to where they'd left off from four years ago, just as if nothing had happened and no time had passed at all – arguing!

He rolled his eyes. "If _my_ sister wants to apologise, then she'll do it herself. That's what it means, Chupachups! I don't even know why you're apologising _for her_, but guess what, I don't _care_! I highly doubt that she even condoned this apology, for that matter – but I just don't _care_! Now, if you will excuse me, I am going to lunch – _on my own!_"

Fuming from the Chupachups comment, she tried to save the situation, "I-"

"Sure, whatever," he told her, already walking off.

"You're not even going to listen to what I have to say!" Emily accused him.

"No, I'm not," he replied, without stopping or turning back to face her, "and you know _why_? Because apparently we don't get along!"

"You don't even-"

He stopped and turned back to her. "Excuse me, are you disagreeing with me? I don't think so, miss! Did I or did I not just insult you not two moments ago? Think real hard! Uh-huh! Yes, there I go again, insulting your intelligence. I'm a lovely, lovely person! Why don't you just leave me alone, and I'll leave off insulting you? How does that sound to you?"

Emily crossed her arms. "No. No. I can here to apologise for my friend's behaviour, which I don't think was the right way to behave, and I'm not leaving until I have done so."

He waved. "Buh-bye!"

"Wha-!" She huffed. "I am _not_ a baby!"

"And I'm not wasting my lunchbreak arguing over this with you," he told her, and turned away again.

"So now I'm wasting your time!" she called after him, upset. "Talking to me is just a waste of your time!"

He laughed, and turned back around to face her. "Look, lady, you're cute, you really are, and persistent – which, by the way, uh-hah, _creepy_ – but I think you need serious, _professional_ help. Don't you be insinuating yourself into my life, okay. Generally, bad shit happens when people do that! Do the right thing! Get help!"

"You're a bastard!" Emily shouted.

"Thank you for that astute observation, ma'am, and I believe this is where we say 'goodbye.'"

"Bastard!" she yelled after him, as he turned away.

He waved.

_Still a jerk_, Emily thought to herself angrily. Had she expected any different? Really? She'd surely only been deluding herself, if she had. _So much for the plan_, she thought. _What a wonderful job you did! He doesn't even want to _talk_ to you! At the risk of repeating myself_ – She laughed. – _wonderful!_

* * *

"Why are you laughing?" he asked, finally, walking back over to her. "Stop laughing, right now. Don't make me call someone for you because I think you're having a mental breakdown!"

She just laughed. She didn't particularly want to, she just couldn't make herself stop. She'd conveniently left her puffer in the car, in her handbag, she realised; if she needed it, she'd have to go back to the car. Which wouldn't really help, if she did need it.

He crossed his arms. "Are we done yet? No?"

She turned away from him and tried to calm herself down. _There's no need for hysterics_, she told herself. _You're embarrassing yourself – in front of _him_!_

She took a couple of deep breaths, then a couple more. When she judged she'd calmed down sufficiently, she turned back around.

He was still standing in the same spot he had been before she'd turned around, still with his arms crossed. He hadn't run away. Apparently he'd changed his mind on the wanting to talk to her thing, she thought.

"Better?"

She showed him her finger.

"Cute," he commented.

"You're a fucking bastard, that's why I was laughing!" she told him darkly.

"Oh, sure, what's not to find amusing about that, love!"

She narrowed her eyes at him in a glare. Oh, he could joke! She was entirely serious!

"I personally don't see what you have to apologise for, _for your friend_. If we said two words to each other, that was a lot."

"She told you to kill yourself!"

"And, curiously, as you will note with your own eyes, I'm still here. Talking to you. I have to say, do you regularly carry out conversations with the dead, miss?" He laughed.

Emily scowled. He wasn't funny! "I still don't think it's right," she told him, annoyed.

"Come on, I'm an awful person, I deserved it!"

"That doesn't make it right!" she replied.

"I'll tell you what, sugar; I look around, at this world, and I don't see a whole lot that I'd term 'right.' I got a whole heap of words, but 'right' just ain't one of them."

Emily crossed her arms. "Well, I think you're wrong! There's nothing wrong with the world!"

"Except people, ninety-five percent of the time."

"That isn't true!" she rebuked.

"Eighty-five, then," he conceded.

She shook her head. "I just can't agree with you."

"Then, fine, see! Why are we even talking to each other? It was real considerate of you to come all the way out here to apologise and see how I'm doin', but, as you can see, I'm jus' fine, and I'm gonna go on bein' jus' fine, so I reckon, I reckon I _know_ you've gotta better things to be doin' than talkin' to someone like me, so ain't it about time you gave a little time to those better things. Don't hurt yourself, not on my account, lady. You just-"

"Spare me the fuckin' monologue, already!" Emily snapped. "Where do you get this shit? _Babar_? _Dumbo the Flying _Elephant?" She laughed. "_Pinocchio_? Grow up!"

He smiled. "I have to say, I've never actually seen any flying elephants, myself."

"Cut the shit!" Emily demanded. "Why are you here?"

He smiled a bit more, and stepped closer to her. "Truthfully?"

She glared. No, she had all day to stand around and listen to his lies!

"Truthfully, I came to see you," he replied. Then, before she clued on to his intentions, he'd put his arms around her. "I thought you might have wanted a hug!"

"Let me go!" she growled in a low, menacing voice.

"Hmm?" he asked, as though he'd been thinking about something and her words had forcibly pulled him from his thoughts.

"Let go of me!" she hissed.

"I could do that," he mused, "or-"

"Or I could scream!"

"You are particularly good at it," he agreed.

"Let go of me!"

"Aren't you cold, darling? Cupcake? Little mouse?"

"'Little mouse'?"

"Okay, sure, it's a little… different, but you can't deny it isn't valid – you are… little…"

"I'm not cold," she scowled. "Let the fuck go of me!"

"Appar… rrrent… llllly…" He let go of her, stepping away from her. "I think I know her!"

Emily practically stopped breathing. Margaret! If he even said anything-! "Why would you do that?" she asked quickly, to divert his attention from her mother, who had taken a seat at a table in a little café off the food court. Furiously, Emily wondered if Margaret had left the kids with Harmony on her own, or if they'd gone back to Missy's, or if Missy had gone around to the apartment her mom shared with Emily's mother.

He frowned. "Do what?"

"You said you came here to see _me_? Why me?"

"That is a very good question," he agreed, nodding.

"Then are you going to give it a very good answer?"

"Maybe it doesn't have one yet," he suggested.

She made a face. Like Hell it didn't!

"Because we're friends! Who… argue a lot! And… you're friends with my sister… as well… who hates me… but not as much as she… comes over as… hating me… or maybe…" He shook his head. "I don't know! And… I'm not kidding you! I don't even know your name!"

"That's a shitty answer!" she told him.

"Yeah. Yeah, it is. But, hey! Friends! You'll forgive me?"

"Ooo, why don't I hear myself saying, 'I forgive you,' yet? Strange, isn't it?"

"Kinda…"

"It's not going to happen!"

"Well," he nodded, "that's sad. That's sad because I was actually starting to be swayed by your _People aren't all bad_ assertion, but now… I have no idea what I'm rambling on about, or why! Seriously, Chupachups, I think I need to go!"

She narrowed her eyes, and shrugged. "Fine!"

"You're scary. Why are you…" he imitated her scowl, shrugging. "Bit of mixed signals, don't you think?"

"Go where?" she scowled. "With who?"

"With myself. To lunch." He rolled his eyes. "The other way 'round. To lunch, by myself. There. Happy now? I answered your incredibly strange, creepy question."

She shook her head. "No. Did you ever think maybe I wanted to go to lunch, too?"

"And I'm stopping you?"

"With someone!"

He started to back away from her. "Oh, okay, so… you're meeting someone for lunch and if they see me they'll think I'm your… cousin… hasten to make a speedy getaway…?"

She grabbed his arm. "With you, you idiot!"

"I have someone!"

"What?"

"Yes. Her name is Maria."

"Maria?"

"Maria Contreras."

"You're lying!"

"What? I am not!"

"It's so your style!" Emily shot.

"True," he agreed.

"You're a jerk!"

"True again."

"You just _want_ me to go to lunch with you!"

"Aye ye ye ye ye! Someone's on the ball today!"

She let go of his arm. "Well, I'm not even hungry!"

"I guess that's just too bad for me, huh?"

"Mmm!"

"I guess this is really _Vaya con Dios_."

"No! It's _Get lost and get out of my life, creep!_"

"You're mean!"

"You're mad!"

"Most likely," he replied. "Look, I think I'm just going to go. Don't… follow me. That really is creepy."

"I'm not the creep!"

"No, you're not. Tootles. _Felices Viajes_."

She glared after him, then diverted her gaze the table where Margaret had taken a seat. Margaret was no longer alone! She raced off after Glen and grabbed his arm. "Do you know that man?"

He frowned, following her gaze. "No. Should I?"

"That's my mom, but I don't know the man," Emily told him.

"Edw-" He frowned. "I stand corrected. That's Jimmy's father. We do know each other."

"Jimmy?" Emily feigned, wondering why her mom would be meeting Jimmy's father.

"My friend. He's dead. Well, he was dead. I can't say for certain what he is now; we lost contact."

Emily looked at him. He was still watching Margaret and Jimmy's father. Apparently he was serious. "Ed?"

"Edward. His name is Edward. He's a doctor. He was a doctor. He was never very happy that Jimmy and I were friends, and I guess he was right. Look how it turned out for Jimmy; not so well, one would agree. Is your mother married?"

Emily stared at him, then said, quite blandly, "Yes."

"That's deep."

"Excuse me?"

"Pardon, Chupachups?"

"I said- I want you to stop calling me Chupachups, for a start! I said, 'Excuse me'!"

"Then what should I call you, if not Ch- If not sweet and a toothache?"

"You're asking for a slap!" she scowled.

"Am I? Strangely enough, I didn't hear myself asking that. My, your ears must be better than my ears."

"My name is Emily!" she ground.

He smiled. "No it isn't!"

She glared. "Yes it is!"

"It is? My apologies, Emily."

She scowled.

"What, not happy? Prefer Chupachups?"

She slapped his arms.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked.

"That's your first and only warning! The next time I'll slap you somewhere where it'll really hurt!"

"Is it just me, or did that sound kinky to you, too?"

Emily stared at him. "You're completely sick!" she told him.

"Oh, come on, you're an attractive woman! It's kind of cute when you say things like that."

Emily took a step away from him, realising that she hadn't let go of his arm, yet, and doing so. She really didn't want to be around this person any longer, and, if she was being honest, she really hadn't wanted to be near him at all.

What a time, of all times, for this thing with her mother and Dr. Edward Rodloff to come up!

"It's all good," Glen told her. "Edward's wife is dead. He's not cheating on her. She's been dead for ages. Do you know what her favourite song was? Stupid, of course you wouldn't. I do! It was Jimmy's favourite song, too. He said it was his favourite because it had been her favourite and that was the one thing he remembered about her, and because it always reminded him of her. Guess! Go on!"

"I have no interest in guessing your dead ex-best friend's favourite song!" she hissed, not stepping any closer to him. "The one whom you _murdered_!"

"Did I?"

She flew at him and punched him in the arm with as much force as she could muster.

He frowned. "I didn't remember! What do you expect?"

"_What do I expect?_" she demanded shrilling, her voice rising.

"You jogged my memory. Thank you."

She stared at him in complete disgust. "Thank you! For reminding you that you _murdered_ your best friend!"

"Yes, thank you. You see, Edward's not stupid. I'll bet this thing with your mother's nothing serious. I mean, perhaps they know one another. Your mother… moved around a lot, and… maybe she met Edward. Maybe she said something about having once lived in Blue Cove, and maybe he even asked her about William. Delaware, expensive psychiatrist. How many expensive psychiatrists can there be in Delaware? Maybe he'd already looked into things a bit and knew that he worked for the Center's Delaware branch, which was situated in Blue Cove. Maybe that's all. Maybe she wanted to tell Edward that…"

"That you're dead," Emily finished.

He nodded. "Exactly what you said." He started forward, before Emily grabbed his arm.

"What are you doing?"

"I thought I could apologise."

"You're supposed to be dead, don't you remember?" she growled.

"But I'm not."

"Oh, yeah, and he's going to understand how someone who is supposed to be dead isn't, much less the fact that you're… not really the proper age you're supposed to be!"

"You have a point. Though, if I may interject: what age is that?"

"You and I both know you look a lot younger than you are!" she growled.

"Very well, you've made your meaning quite clear. He's telling her about how hard it was after June's disappearance, and then, when he found out that she was dead. He didn't really feel like much of anything, least of all going on, but he couldn't bring himself to abandon James. He was a part of June, after all, and he had loved June. If only he had been there for June more often, perhaps she wouldn't have left, and perhaps she wouldn't have died. Jimmy would have had a mother, and he'd have had a wife; they'd have been a family."

He frowned. "She left because she was asked to by the people at work, Edward. It was nothing to do with either you or Jimmy."

"How do you know that?" Emily accused.

He turned to frown at her. "Sorry. No. Of course, you're right. I don't. A thing I do, quite annoying really, must really give that up. It's not my place to take liberties with people's… lives, I guess. No, that's private. Bad Empath!"

Emily stared at him.

He shook his head. "I have to go back to work; you go on, go say 'hi' to your mom and Edward, just, don't let on that you know who he is. _Adios_."

She glared after him, but he didn't turn back. Perhaps he really had to work. June Rodloff. She turned around and walked away, in the direction of the café.

* * *

Edward was pleased to meet her, he said. She asked who he was, of course; they weren't old friends and she'd forgotten his face, were they? How embarrassed she would be!

No, he said, he was Edward. Then he showed her a photograph of a family, his family, he said, and, for a long moment, she stared at the little boy – How old was he in the photograph? Two? Two and a half? – and then her eyes moved over to the other people in the picture, the mother and father.

She said nothing, then, slowly, she smiled. "You all look lovely," she said, then she got up and walked away.

Her mom and Edward both stared after her, but she didn't come back to the table, she didn't even particularly care that she was leaving behind the coffee that her mother had ordered that was yet to arrive, she just had to get up and walk.

She felt sick.

She wanted to cry.

She had an awful, awful suspicion. A suspicion about her friend, June, who Lyle had once said worked for the Tower, and a little boy whose name she couldn't even bring to mind.

Maybe she started to cry.

She didn't notice.

She couldn't believe that June – her _friend_ – would do something like that, that she would hurt someone else's child because they had hurt hers, much less that she would kill a child, anyone's child, for whatever reason!

Nobody came after her, not her mom, not Edward; she didn't even hope that they did, she didn't want them coming near her, she just wanted to be alone.

That's all.

Alone.

* * *

She was sitting outside, at the bus stop, actually, when she realised that actually that was where she was; she hadn't really been paying attention to anything, it was just that, now, someone had come over and said her name. So she'd made herself pay attention: _What? Can't you leave me the fuck alone? Can't you see I don't want to be near anyone?_ But she didn't say anything, she just said nothing.

"Are you alright? You look upset."

"No," she snapped. "I'm not."

"You're not upset, or you're not alright?"

She laughed, brushing at her face, though she'd stopped crying a while ago and her eyes and cheeks had dried in the meantime.

He sat down beside her. "Are you waiting for the bus?"

"No."

"Same."

"Then why are you fucking annoying me?" she yelled, jumping to her feet.

"You looked sad."

"Well I'm not!"

"Come on, of course you are. I can see that you are. Why are you saying that you're not?"

She pointed a finger at him as though in accusation, but, despite her best efforts, her hand still shook. "I HAVE NOTHING TO SAY TO YOU! I WANTED YOU TO BE DEAD, BUT YOU CAN'T EVEN DO THAT RIGHT! GET OUT OF MY LIFE, YOU LOSER! I HATE YOU!"

"For having nothing to say to me, that's quite a bit to say, actually," he told her calmly.

"I SAID 'I HATE YOU'! FUCK OFF! FUCK OFF – LEAVE ME ALONE!"

He got up and walked up to her. "Look, I know you're upset. I shouldn't have come here, I see that now. You were moving on with your life, things weren't perfect, but they were how you wanted them to be. They were more so how you wanted them to be than _this_! I won't stay long. You're right. You can't just expect to come along and suddenly you're part of the family again. It doesn't work that way." He reached out for her hand. "I just… I know that she'll be alright. She's got Jarod, now, and he's got her. I guess… But you'll be alright. You will, won't you? You see, we don't even know each other. You'll be fine, you really will." He let go of her hand. "There you go, you can have your hand back." He smiled. "I wasn't going to keep it. But you have a good afternoon, yeah. Just, try your best. That's all we can all do. You weren't wrong. Goodbye, I guess."

Emily wasn't even really listening; she just kept thinking, over and over, how she couldn't remember the name of Snow's half brother, of that poor little boy. Quietly, almost in a whisper, she asked, "Can you hug me?"

"Pardon?"

"Can you hug me?" she repeated, but she couldn't make herself speak up. She was afraid she'd start crying again.

"Of course I can, darling," he told her, and then he hugged her.

It was strange, she thought, how some times she could be so angry at him, and then, at other times, she wasn't angry at all.


	4. Chapter 4

_Two weeks later_

Gwen and her boyfriend had broken up; nothing Maria said to her seemed to cheer her up. She said she'd rather have talked to Glen, but Glen wasn't around anymore. He'd left town; Maria didn't know why, but she didn't care, either. She hadn't liked him, and she was glad. The only thing she wasn't glad about was the Gwen wouldn't talk to her. She had the horrible feeling that Gwen would leave her, too; that she'd suddenly decide that she didn't want to be friends with her anymore.

Gwen's boyfriend hadn't really been her boyfriend, he hadn't even been fifteen, and in honesty, Maria thought that Gwen had been reading him the wrong way. He hadn't been looking for a girlfriend, just for a good time, and Gwen had seemed like so much more fun that all of the little girls at the school he went to. In Maria's reserved opinion, he sounded like a little creep, but she'd never said so to Gwen; Gwen was cut up enough over it.

Maria and Gwen didn't go out on girly nights outside of work; Gwen had promised to exchange numbers, but Maria was still waiting.

Maria looked around her bedroom. She was 18 and still lived with her aunt and uncle. She felt like a cheat. She should have gotten a place of her own, but her aunt and uncle wanted her to be safe and comfortable. She was family and they loved her, they said. That was just what family meant; family meant you always had someone to love you.

So Maria stayed at her aunt and uncle's. She knew 'family' didn't mean the same thing to everyone.

Looking around her room, she noticed how untidy it had got, and got down to pick up all of the clothes she'd strewn on the floor.

Even though she didn't have Gwen's number, and Gwen didn't have hers, she still kept waiting for Gwen's call, she still kept waiting for Gwen to ask to talk to her. She supposed Gwen might have had a crush on Glen, and she'd ruined that, hadn't she!

As she picked up items of clothing and folded them on her bed, she kept thinking that Gwen was going to tell her they couldn't be friends anymore, then she kept thinking, _Don't be stupid._

She stood up, when she'd finished all of her folding, and decided she would take a walk outside. She just needed to get away from the confines of the same four walls, ceiling and floor, the same windows, the same view.

She grabbed a coat and hit the street, humming a Christina Aguilera tune as she walked.

She wasn't as soft as some other girls, but she dreamed of the same things they did. She dreamed of the house, and of the someone to hold.

* * *

After school, Snow liked to go for a walk around the neighbourhood for an hour. Emily had never said he couldn't, and, like some of the other kids in his grade, he didn't have his videogames to keep him inside. He preferred to go outside and take a walk; three hours playing some game wasn't healthy, in his opinion.

Sometimes he took the bus to the library, sometimes he didn't. Mostly, he went to the library on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. It was Tuesday, he was thinking about asking Missy if she could spend some time with him to give him piano lessons. He really thought giving himself an outlet in music would do him a lot of good, and Farfalla always said she loved the piano.

At the moment, his aunt was listening to a Canadian group from the eighties called ISIS DANS L'AMOUR, which translated, in English, to _Isis__ in love_. Her husband, Jarod, had sent it to her. When he was away, out of town, he would send her things, and call her every night. Snow thought that was nice, and the twins did miss their father. He usually rang early enough to say 'hello' to the twins.

Snow wished his own father would call, but he couldn't remember having met him once, and, seeing as he was dead, he didn't suppose he'd ever be ringing. From what he'd gleaned from his aunt, who'd been his father's twin sister, he probably wouldn't have liked to have met his father; he hadn't been a nice person. His grandmothers shared his aunt's opinion. He supposed they couldn't all have been mistaken, and he trusted Missy.

She'd never looked at him with disdain just because his father had been her twin and they hadn't got along. She'd always been as supportive of him as she was of Far.

At the moment, his mother was really down. He could have stayed in the house, he reasoned, and mope and pretend he thought she might just talk to him, or he could go out and try to cheer up and be a positive influence of Far when he was around, rather then being just as down as his mother.

He walked to the park and decided he'd just spend some time walking around. He'd never really been one of those kids who played in the park after school; sometimes, he wished he could have been. He knew he freaked his mom out with his bookishness. Sometimes, he freaked himself out.

_Reading books is nice_, he always told himself, _so you can read, but do you have the attitude that makes you want to learn, to get out there and see how things really are, or do you just expect to read it all in some book._ He knew that wasn't the right way, especially for someone like him. He had to get involved with the world and stay in tune with people and the rest of the world. He sure as Hell didn't want to end up one of those people so confused about how they'd always thought the world should be that when he saw the truth, he just couldn't take it and denied it flat out. He wasn't going to be that person.

Maybe he was ten, soon to be eleven, but he wasn't stupid, and he knew he couldn't throw it all away thinking that he knew so much better because he was _clever_.

* * *

Maria turned into the park two blocks from her house and took a deep breath. The air was way nicer than that in her bedroom, she thought. If she could have had a house on a property with some trees, she would have liked that. But she was only 18 and she was yet to see where her future took her. She hoped it was somewhere good.

She had just passed a bench along the path when she spotted someone lying on the grass. She stopped and stared at the person for a moment, deciding that it was a teenager. He was maybe 13, maybe 14. He was just lying on the grass. She wondered if he was okay.

She could have just walked away, she thought, but he didn't look like he was very dangerous. He was dressed well, not too posh, but he was wearing something that fit properly and wasn't so shabby it could have come out on the losing end of a catfight. Maybe Gwen liked those types, but she didn't. She could never really take them for serious, and even though they may have been nice people, she just didn't have much regard for people who wilfully projected a crappy image of themselves to other people. It screamed _Leave me alone!_, to her.

She walked over to the boy and saw that he was watching the sky. He had blue eyes; she had brown. Though she saw people with blue eyes everyday, nobody in her family was blue-eyed, and they took her back a little.

"Hi," she said.

At the sound of her voice, he seemed suddenly to realise that she was standing there and sat up, pushing himself to his feet. "Hello," he said back.

"You okay?" she asked, now feeling a bit silly. Obviously he was.

He smiled at her. "Yep."

She shrugged. "That's cool, I guess."

He shook his head. "No, thankyou for asking. I find that very encouraging. That, in spite of everything that's happened in the world, in spite of all the things that get us down, you will always still find someone willing to put themselves out there and ask someone else how they are."

She stared at him. Was he for serious?

"Good on you!"

He patted her arm.

She went on staring. The thought occurred to her that she was probably making a fool of herself, but she couldn't make herself say anything. She was afraid she'd say something angry, or accuse him of being mad.

He nodded. "Maybe we'll bump into each other sometime, but if we don't, and even if we do, I hope someone's good enough to ask you how you are when they think maybe you need to feel you're still a part of something and that that something cares. Have a good afternoon, yeah?"

He stepped past her and walked away.

She stared at the empty space where he'd been standing moments before, thinking, _Is that kid really okay?_

She spun about and looked for him. She called out, "I'm okay!" She didn't know exactly why, but maybe it was just because she didn't really expect people his age to say things like that. Maybe she was getting too old, maybe she was starting to lose confidence in the young people of today. She shook herself mentally and walked to catch him up; he'd stopped and was watching her.

"Do you… like ice-cream?" she asked, feeling a blush creep up into her cheeks. Now she was treating him like a little kid.

He nodded. "I do, yes."

"You wanna get an ice-cream, then?" she suggested, blushing harder and fully expecting some sort of accusation that would show her the type of person he really was and break the illusion.

"Okay," he answered, with a smile.

She nodded and they began to walk. "My house isn't far," she told him. "I could take my car and we could have a look at the shops."

"Really?"

"Really, yeah."

He frowned and held out his hand. "Shaun."

She stopped and turned to take his hand. "Maria."

* * *

They sat at Wendy's, eating ice-creams and talking about trigonometry. Maria didn't know why they were talking about trig, but it was totally okay with her. She hadn't had ice-cream in ages, she just hadn't felt like having it, and now that she had someone to eat it with, she felt more like having it. Maybe she was even happy; she was sure she was smiling more than she'd smiled in a long time. (She didn't think she'd ever be so happy talking about trigonometry!)

When they'd finished their ice-creams, they had a look at the bookstore for books on trigonometry and laughed about what the book said.

Maria thought that Shaun was pretty clever about maths for a 14-year-old. He got all of the problems right just by doing them in his head; she even checked them in the back of the book, before one of the sales assistants asked them if she could be of help and they said 'no' and put the book away, laughing when they left the store.

They walked past a supermarket and saw that some of the flowers were discounted; Shaun bought his mom some flowers with his pocket money. Maria thought that was really cute.

They sat in the car, in the parking lot, trying to pick off the discounted sticker and listening to Christina Aguilera.

Shaun said he liked baroque. It was a type of classical music, it helped him think and relaxed him when he was stressed.

Before she could plaster a hand over her mouth, Maria had asked if they could listen to some of his baroque music together one day; her car's stereo system was pretty good and it had awesome bass.

They finally got the sticker off, and Shaun agreed.

She tried to tell herself that she shouldn't be so pleased about that, but it didn't really work. She couldn't help smiling. She really liked his smile.

On the way home, she decided that it would be best to drop him back off at the park, where they'd first met. She didn't want to get him in trouble with his parents, she told herself, but maybe she was afraid that if she knew where he lived she'd go around to say 'hi' and really make a mess of things for them both.

She asked if he'd be okay getting home, and, of course, he said, he would. They stood beside her car and she didn't know whether she should maybe wave, or what to say.

"You're really cool, Maria," he told her, and she felt herself blushing again.

"I hope so!" she laughed, and he smiled.

"Bye!"

"Bye."

She didn't give herself the time to stand around and watch him leave the park; she put the car in reverse and drove out of the parking lot.

* * *

The next day, when she got off from work, she dropped by the park and waited in her car. She didn't know why she was getting her hopes up, but she decided she might as well give him a chance. Maybe he really wanted to spread the love of classical music to the world, she thought, and laughed.

She was listening to Jordin Sparks when she heard a knock on the window and turned to see Shaun.

She turned the key in the ignition and wound the automatic window down. "Get in," she told him.

He opened the door and handed her the CD he was holding.

She turned it over to read the back, then switched the music off and ejected the CD, replacing it with the classical disc.

She sat back and closed her eyes to listen to the music.

After a while, she opened her eyes and glanced over at Shaun. "So, how are things for you?" she asked.

"Yeah, they're manageable. My mom's kinda down, but I think the flowers helped. Tulips are her favourite. It was really good to see her smile. It's been a while."

"How come she's down?" Maria asked, then felt stupid. She was imposing, that wasn't right.

"I think she's lonely," Shaun told her. "She's got my sister and I, but I think she'd really like the company of an adult. A man, I mean. I just don't want her getting into trouble with the wrong sort of person because she's… because she just wants someone to care for her and love her. Getting to know a person well enough to trust them with things like physical intimacy can take a lot more time than people think; it doesn't just happen… you know, in an hour or two."

Maria frowned. "Does your mom have a lot of boyfriends?" As soon as the words had left her mouth – she could have kicked herself! She didn't know why she kept saying things like she was, but she just felt like she could say anything to Shaun. She had to silently caution herself.

"No."

Maria frowned. "I apologise for getting so… personal," she told him, feeling embarrassment rise in her cheeks.

"You don't have to apologise," he replied. "It's good to have someone to talk to."

Maria forced herself to smile and closed her eyes. She really needed the relaxing power of baroque right now.

* * *

Halfway through the CD, Shaun suggested they take a walk in the park, and she hastily agreed. The confines of the car were too stifling; she felt better out amongst the trees and the breeze.

"My aunt says maybe she can teach me piano in a few weeks. I mean, start giving me lessons," Shaun told her, as they were passing the playground.

"That sounds awesome," Maria replied, not knowing what else to say. She didn't play, herself, but she thought it was cool if someone else had that kind of discipline. "Are you really excited?"

He nodded, smiling across at her. "Yep!"

She smiled too. "Race you back to the car?"

"You're on!"

They spun about and made their way back the way they'd come at a run; Maria made sure not to speed ahead. When they could see the car, Shaun put his hand out and she found herself taking it. It wasn't a bit awkward, until they had to let go of each other's hands at the car.

Shaun laughed, so she laughed along with him, pretending she was as fine with it as him. She didn't know if it was a good idea for her to see him again, but they hadn't even finished the CD yet.

She wondered if she was doing the right thing, or if it would be kinder to tell him goodbye.

She got the CD out of the stereo and handed it to him, and he smiled at her and said goodbye. She found herself standing around to watch him walk to the edge of the parking lot, then she hurried to her car door and got in.

Maybe it was time to talk to Gwen; maybe she needed Gwen's horror. She was sure Gwen would freak major time when she found out that Shaun was so much younger than her, especially in the light of Gwen's own recent experience and the debacle that had been.

* * *

It was a whole fortnight since the day they'd first met, and Maria found herself unable to say anything to Gwen. Gwen had met a nice boy named Evan and all she wanted to talk about was Evan, Evan, Evan.

Maria didn't want to spoil her happiness, though she hoped like Hell that Evan was as nice as Gwen said.

Shaun and she went for a walk in the park, as they often did, but they were practically the only ones. It was cold and blowy and, as they were walking back from the playground, it started to rain.

Laughing, they pelted to the car, reaching over easily for each other's hand as they ran, and Maria felt two things at almost exactly the same time: very happy, and very frightened.

She realised that she was quite happy to hold Shaun's hand, but what she really wanted wasn't to just hold his hand. She could picture it going farther than that, and that frightened her. She didn't think Shaun was old enough for that, though he was 14. He was a really nice boy and she didn't want to ruin their friendship.

Reaching the car, she hit the central locking on her keys and they scrambled inside, pulling the doors shut after them.

She switched on the ignition and turned the heater on, and only after all that did she have the time to look at herself, or Shaun. She realised that they were soaked. The heater probably wouldn't do that much good; a raincoat would have been better.

She turned the engine on and put the car into gear. "Maybe I should take you home, yeah?" she said.

He smiled.

She felt herself shiver. Did she really need to know where he lived? She could hardly send him out in the rain to walk home on his own, and, she began to wonder, she didn't even know if his mom was going to lose it or not.

She threw a glance over her shoulder and backed the car up, then returned her gaze to his face. "What do you say we wait until we're dry until we head home?" she suggested. "We could watch DVDs or something?"

"Sounds like a plan," he agreed.

She frowned. "Is it okay if we don't go back to my place?" If Shaun's mom didn't freak, her aunt and uncle would! "We could check out that new motel. I bet they have awesome heaters!"

"And they have that café diner!" Shaun enthused. "We could get drinks!"

She smiled. "So, yeah?"

He nodded. "Let's go for it!"

She took the car out onto the road, looking forward to a hot drink and a DVD.

* * *

She got the room, and Shaun got the coffees. She didn't go off at him for getting himself a coffee, she wasn't the sort of person who got super mad over things like that, and it wasn't even as though he was a little kid.

There were only a couple of years between them, in reality.

They sat down in front of the heater to sip their coffees and she felt okay. She'd check out the rest of the room later, but right now she was happy to sip her coffee and sit in front of the warm heater with Shaun sitting beside her.

* * *

After the coffees, they sat down on the bed to watch television for a while; there was nothing on TV, so they took a look through the DVDs to rent from the main office. There was a booklet on top of the fridge, which she got down, and they read together, laughing at some of the DVD titles.

Deciding that the DVDs were actually a bit of a rip-off just to rent, they lay back on the bed to listen to the rain, though they really couldn't hear the rain, just the heater.

She didn't really know she'd closed her eyes until she felt Shaun touch her hand, and she opened her eyes. He was holding her hand; she smiled, but he wasn't looking. He had closed his eyes, too.

She closed her eyes again and told herself it was perfectly okay just holding hands.

* * *

"Maria? Did you hear that?"

She opened her eyes, realising that she must have drifted off in spite of the earlier coffee, and frowned, struggling to sit up. "No. Hear what?" she asked.

"Thunder," Shaun told her. He sat up, beside her.

She stared at him. "Shaun, do you think it would be okay if I said something kinda freaky?" She winced. 'Kinda freaky'! What a wonderful choice of words!

"Okay," he said.

She was glad that he didn't sound scared, but she wasn't so sure that would last. "Do you think we could lie down together?" she asked.

He smiled. "Sure, Maria."

She frowned, feeling the familiar heat colouring her face. "I didn't mean… I mean just like we are…" She felt her throat constricting. She wished she didn't have to say this, but she knew she had to put it out there, she had to give him some warning, some sort of choice. "Without…" She pulled at her jumper. Her voice shook. "Without all of this, Shaun."

Shaun let go of her hand. She suddenly noticed how wide his eyes had gone. He shook his head. He seemed to be struggling with something he wanted to say.

Maria shivered. She felt the horrible weight of dread bearing down on her; this was the end of their friendship, she could feel it.

"If you're comfortable with that, Maria. I'm not fussy about nakedness," he replied.

She stared at him, and for a moment, she thought that it might have been half in horror. Did he… did he not like girls? She knew it was a silly, selfish thought, but she couldn't, as hard as she tried, push it away. (What in the Hell was wrong, if he did like boys?) She said nothing, though. Instead, she began to pull off her jumper.

* * *

Feeling like maybe she should give him a bit of a break, Maria made sure to pull the blanket up over them both, and when Shaun shifted over to rest his head on her arm, she couldn't help being a bit startled.

"Maria," he murmured.

"Yeah, Shaun?"

"I start piano lessons tomorrow," he told her.

"Do you?"

"Yep."

"Are you nervous?"

He was quiet for a while.

She turned her head to sneak a peek at his face. He was staring at her, frowning.

"I think so," he answered.

"You don't have to be, you know."

"I know."

"I believe in you."

He laughed.

"Hey! What's funny?"

"I was thinking that it's really nice, actually," he told her.

She smiled.

"Can you hear the rain, Maria?"

"No."

"Me neither."

They didn't speak for a long time after that, they just looked into to each other's eyes.

Finally, though, Maria announced. "We should probably get back," and Shaun nodded, already sitting up. He put his hands out for her, and she grinned, and he helped her sit up.

* * *

"Maria?"

"I'm listening," Maria told him, as they were driving. It still hadn't stopped raining, rain sloshed back and forth across the windshield at the command of the windscreen wipers, constantly lashing down from the sky.

"You're really warm. I didn't know you were so warm."

A frown worked its way onto Maria's face. An odd comment, she thought. She glanced across at him. "And is that a good thing or a bad?"

"It's good, Maria," Shaun replied.

She smiled. "I think you're warm, too."

He frowned. "I think my mom's sad because my dad's dead."

Maria's smile fell away. "Oh…" she said.

Shaun shook his head. "She's not supposed to be sad, though. He was the enemy. She's supposed to hate him, even when he's dead."

Maria choked. "What kind of bullshit is that, Shaun?" she demanded, suddenly upset.

"A whole heap," he said quietly.

Maria stared at him.

He shuffled closer and put his head on her shoulder.

"I think so," she agreed.

She kept driving, the rain kept falling.

* * *

They'd maybe been going to the motel for a month, just to lie together without any pretences, when Shaun suggested that they visit a music store. He could show her how well he played now, he said. It wasn't so well, but he'd really like to show her.

Of course, she couldn't help but smile and say she'd really like to see him play, too. To make sure his aunt was teaching him the right sort of music for beginners; nothing too… ABBA. ABBA was supposed to be complicated, she'd heard.

He smiled. He liked ABBA, though he'd only really heard two or three of their songs.

She nodded. She liked ABBA, too.

He shuffled closer to her, and she turned her face to look at him, suddenly finding that they were too close. She couldn't look at him with those eyes and still think straight; it was horrible. All she could think was how wonderful, wonderful, wonderful it would feel to kiss him, and how delicious.

She felt herself start to shiver. He needed to look away. "Can I just be alone for a while?" she asked in a quiet voice, and she watched his expression become a frown.

"Are you okay? Is something wrong?" he asked.

She put a hand over her face; it was shaking. "I want to kiss you," she breathed, "and that's not the half of it."

Without looking, she knew that he had sat up. She could feel it; she felt suddenly colder than before.

"Maria? Maria, take your hand away from your eyes."

She slid her hand down her face and rested it under the blanket, on her stomach. Shaun was staring at her. She felt her stomach knot.

"I wouldn't say anything," he told her.

She shot up from the mattress. "What?"

"Maybe we could kiss," he said. "We could see what it felt like."

She shook her head, wide-eyed.

"I want to try," he told her.

She put her hand out and rested it on his arm.

"Could we?"

"You really want to?" she asked.

He nodded. "I do."

She frowned. "Come a bit closer," she said, suddenly nervous.

He shuffled closer.

She left her hand on his arm. "Um…"

He leant in and pressed his lips to hers. It only took a second, and then she was lost. She wouldn't have stopped if the Fire Brigade had broken in to tell her the motel was on fire – _she_ was on fire, nothing else mattered!

She didn't know when she moved her hands from his arms, or when they lay down together again, she just knew that it felt wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, just as she'd imagined it would.

She didn't have time to be frightened by how far they'd suddenly gone, or how they weren't just kissing anymore, she was enjoying herself too much to think too much. She couldn't think about what her aunt or uncle, or Gwen, or even Shaun's mother might think.

* * *

Afterwards, they left the motel room and sat down at a table in the café diner to have coffee and burgers and chips.

They held hands under the table and Maria tried not to smile or stare too much. In public, they would have to be careful.

"I didn't do the wrong thing, did I?" she asked, once they were back in the parking lot at the park.

Shaun smiled. "If you did, we both did," he told her, and she felt warmer inside.

She pulled up her sleeve and reached over to wipe a bit of ketchup from his cheek.

He touched her hand. "Thankyou, Maria."

* * *

Maria didn't think she had ever been happier. They did go to that music store, and she smiled so much. She was so excited for Shaun; he was getting good!

Sometimes, he would draw her a colourful bunch of flowers with his little sister's crayons because he was saving up for a piano (which was going to take a long time) and couldn't buy her any. But the times she liked best was when he would draw them for her, on her stomach, or in the small of her back, or on the inside of her thigh. She found out all the places where she was ticklish, and she would laugh and laugh.

She thought that, when he was older, she was going to marry that boy. Maybe it was weird, but she thought she was in love.

They listened to baroque and ABBA on the stereo of her car, and ran in the park, and danced on the bed in the motel room without any music. Their room was Number 19, it was Maria's new favourite number.

Gwen and Evan had broken up, and Gwen was with Derek.

One afternoon, Maria and Gwen decided to go out to a café after work to talk about girl stuff, and Derek. Derek was so cool, Gwen said, Derek, Derek, Derek. Maria asked what Derek did, how old he was, if he had a car. He worked for an electronics shop, he was 20, he had a really, really awesome car.

When they said goodbye, Maria and Gwen even hugged. Maria was happy, but she was a bit late meeting Shaun. She hoped he wouldn't be mad at her. Maybe he had already gone home, thinking that she wasn't coming, or maybe he'd be late one time, just to show her how it felt.

She pushed those thoughts away. It was just once, and Shaun wasn't like that. After Gwen had left, she'd quickly made a detour to the toilets in the plaza to fix her lip gloss. She didn't usually wear flavoured lip gloss, but she'd seen it and thought Shaun might like it.

She pulled up the car in the parking lot and got out, looking over to the new Information board and bench that had been put in three days ago. She hadn't seen Shaun waiting for her, so maybe she'd wait at the bench instead of always sitting in her car. It wasn't a bad day.

The car keys slipped out of her hand.

She ran to the Information board and fell on the ground beside Shaun. He was having some sort of seizure. Suddenly, she realised she was crying. She wanted to touch him but she didn't know what to do, and she didn't want to make it worse.

The tears blurred her eyes and she dug around in her pocket furiously for her cell phone, then dialled 911 and asked for the ambulance. She just wanted to hug him.

The police arrived before the ambulance and she told them that she'd just gotten to the park and had seen him from her car. She wanted to say, _Yes, we know each other. He's my boyfriend. His name is Shaun._ but she couldn't think.

One of the police officers had moved him onto his side, and Maria couldn't stop thinking, over and over, _Hurry up, hurry up, hurry up, hurry up._

When the ambulance came, she wasn't told which hospital he would be taken to. She had a feeling, she knew, though, and she had a feeling that the police thought he might have been taking drugs.

She didn't say anything. She couldn't. She wasn't allowed to. She just nodded when they said she could go home, when they asked if she was alright, and if she could get home on her own.

She watched them leave, and it was just Maria.

_Go home_, she told herself. _Come on, Maria, pull it together. Get in your car and get on home._

So she did.

* * *

She went to her bedroom to lie down, and the next time she woke, it was to find her aunt standing by her bed, wearing a furious expression. Her aunt was a nurse.

She sat up shakily and stared at the piece of paper her aunt was holding.

The piece of paper was dropped on her bed, and her aunt stormed out.

Maria picked up the paper with shaking hands and forced her eyes to work.

_Your smile is a thousand pink roses blossoming at once,_

_Your lips against mine are like dew,_

_Your eyes, when they look into mine, are like the sun that the plants reach for,_

_They draw me in and promise to keep me safe, they promise to keep me warm,_

_When you love me, there is nothing else in the world that I need,_

_I only need to love you back,_

_I wanted to write this poem so you would know how special you are to me,_

_You make the whole world special, too, just by being in it,_

_If you read this and laugh, I will be glad I could make you smile,_

_If you don't care for me anymore, one day, I will try to understand,_

_I think, if that is okay with you, I think I love you._

Maria's eyes filled with tears. She brushed them away shakily so they didn't stain the paper and got out of bed.

She walked slowly down the hallway. Her aunt was sitting in the kitchen, drinking a mug of coffee.

"How is he?" she asked, but her voice was just about a whisper.

Maya didn't look at her. Instead, she said to her coffee, "He's fucking epileptic, that's what he is!"

Maria sniffed, and wiped her runny nose on the back of her sleeve.

"Maria! For the love of God, his family are Center people!" Maya's voice was shaking now, too, and Maria was crying.

She hadn't known. She shook her head. It didn't even matter – Shaun wasn't like that.

Maya wasn't psychic, or an Empath, she just heard Voices.

"Catherine Parker's daughter!" Maya was yelling, on her feet now.

"_Yo no sabía, tía_," Maria sobbed. I didn't know, aunty. "_Lo siento. Pero Shaun no me haría daño. Él me ama! Lo amo…_" I'm sorry. But Shaun wouldn't hurt me. He loves me! I love him…

A dark look came into Maya's eyes, and she lowered her voice. "Maria, he's only a child, he wouldn't know what love is! He wouldn't know how to love you!"

Maria shook her head vehemently, brushing away her tears from her cheeks. "_Él no es un niño!_ _Él me ama!_" He's not a child! He loves me!

"He's _eleven_, Maria! _Eleven!_ That is a child, in my books!"

Maria stared at her aunt. Her heart was beating too hard for her to speak.

"He is also an Empath. What have I always said: You can never trust an Empath, Maria."

Maria could only shake her head.

"Yes, Maria, he is no different from the others."

"_Él me ama!_" she shouted. "He loves me!"

"He wouldn't know how to love anyone, Maria. Do you have any idea what I have just told you? He is the child of those Parkers! Not a single one of them has ever known how to love anyone but themselves, Maria! Not even one of them! He is no different! His mother may be _un extraño_, but he is a Parker!"

Maria couldn't listen to her aunt any longer; she turned around and fled from the kitchen. How could she believe her aunt's words!


	5. Chapter 5

When Maria woke, it was dark. It had been dark before, too, nothing was new. Except that she wasn't alone in her room, and it wasn't her aunt or her uncle. Shaun was sitting on the side of her bed, just looking at her.

She sat up, realising that she was angry at him. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I'm sorry, Maria," he told her. "It was wrong of me to let you think I was something I wasn't. I can't…" He swayed a bit before putting out a hand to steady himself. "I can't stay long, Maria…"

She narrowed her eyes at him in a glare. "I didn't ask you to come! Get out! Get out before I call the cops! Or my aunt!"

"Okay…" he mumbled, and stood up.

She opened her mouth to snap something at him, and he collapsed to the floor. "Shaun!" Leaping out of bed, she stared at the floor. He wasn't there! He'd just… disappeared.

She lay back down. It was a dream, that was it, just a dream. She closed her eyes. Shaun hadn't come to see her, he hadn't apologised, and he hadn't just disappeared into thin air.

* * *

"I'm sorry, mom," Snow told Emily, but she wouldn't move away from the window. She'd come to see him first thing in the morning, but as soon as he'd woken up, she hadn't looked at him once; she just went on staring out the window. "Mom, aren't you going to say anything?"

The door opened and Farfalla came in, holding Missy's hand. "What happened?" she asked.

Snow shuffled over so he could hug her when she came to the side of the bed. "They said I have epilepsy, but I think it's rubbish."

Missy smacked him over the back of the head. It hurt.

"What's going on?" Farfalla asked, suddenly panicked, but Snow just stared at his aunt.

"It isn't rubbish!" Missy growled.

"It's okay," Snow told his little sister, hugging her tighter.

A laugh from the door announced Margaret's appearance on the scene. "But if his father had known what he was talking about, if he hadn't been _lying_, Snow wouldn't have this problem!" she hissed, her tone caught between hatred and amusement.

Emily turned away from the window, finally. "I am a Mediator, mom. That doesn't change the fact that Snow is an Empath."

"What are you talking about?" Far cried.

"It's alright," Snow soothed her.

Margaret laughed. "You're a Recessive, plain and simple!"

Emily shook her head. Why was she even arguing this with her mom? What did her mom even know?

"Recessive's don't exist," Missy interrupted calmly. "Not as far as I know. Snow may very well have inherited Em's Mediation abilities, but sometimes even that's not enough to stabilise a person's Empathy completely. You need training, _plain and simple_! Years of training."

Margaret glared at her dirtily.

Missy didn't so much as blink. She turned on her heel and walked out of the room, throwing back a quick, "Don't start a war!"

Snow knew she was going to call Jarod; maybe they could get him that training, maybe Angelo would be able to help.

* * *

Jarod passed along Persephone's number, which Missy punched into her cell phone when she'd finished the call with Jarod. They were all okay, she'd told him. Snow would live; he didn't have to drop everything and come running. She had this under control.

He didn't object, so she figured he believed her. She was glad he wasn't in a mood; if he had been, he mightn't have been so quick to trust her. She was glad, too, for how far they'd been able to move past the past, and into their future together. It wasn't always happy, but, when it worked, it made her happy, and she had a fair idea that it made him happy, too.

"Athena's Arms Flowers and Gifts," a female's voice answered on the other end of the line.

"Is Persephone in?" Missy asked.

"Speaking," came the reply.

"We need to meet. When would be convenient for you?"

"Where would we be meeting?"

Missy gave her the name of the place in Dover.

"Three, maybe four days," Persephone replied.

"Four, alright. I'll see you then, lunchtime." She hung up, and rang Jarod back to relay the arrangements.

* * *

_Four days later_

Missy's eyes settled on the two-year-old. Persephone had introduced her as Kyla. When she saw her looking, the little girl smiled at Missy: hello. Missy looked away from the little girl, to the child's father.

She'd come with Emily and Snow; Margaret and Harmony were minding the children. She hadn't been all that keen on either Margaret or Harmony accompanying them, and she'd thought it would do Emily some good to get out of the house once in a while and go someplace she hadn't been for a while.

Emily sat beside Missy, not saying anything. Missy wondered if she had decided that Empaths were untrustworthy and, therefore, that she couldn't trust Angelo. She'd already explained that they were old friends, but she had a feeling Emily had already known that.

Snow was staring at Kyla, who was now staring back at him. Missy wondered if he was trying to silently communicate with her. Perhaps he thought she might have inherited some of her father's Empathic ability.

Missy shook the thought from her mind, and laid out the problem for Angelo and Persephone. Persephone had been an expert in Empathy, despite not being an Empath herself, and Missy figured it couldn't hurt to share the story with her, too. She had also been Snow's half brother, Reagan's, mentor.

"What number am I thinking of?" Persephone asked suddenly.

"Two."

She frowned. "Five."

He shrugged.

She put her hand behind her back. "How many fingers do I have up?"

"Three."

"Good. Again."

"One."

She glanced at Angelo for a moment, silently, then back to Snow. "Do you have any idea what brought on your epilepsy? What triggered it? Have you had anything like this before?"

Snow shook his head.

"Has anything been troubling you especially, of late?"

"No more than usual," he replied.

"What sort of things trouble you?"

"I guess, school."

"School, and what else?"

"I guess it's just school."

Persephone gave him a look that said, _Yeah right._ "Troubles at home?"

He rolled his eyes. "Why is it that people always go for 'troubles at home' right off the bat? It's old. And sick. No, nobody's been molesting me; yes, I get fed; no, my mom doesn't make me go and think about my 'behaviour' by making me sit outside when it's cold, or in the wardrobe. I'm not confused about my sexuality, I don't wish I was dead, secretly or otherwise. I'm not scared that aliens are going to take over the world."

Emily snorted.

Snow sighed. "What do you think, of course it gets me down sometimes that my little sister can't see, but that's how she is and I love her, despite that, and she loves me, too. Yes, I would prefer that mom was happier, but how she feels is entirely up to her, and I have no right complaining about it. She does talk about killing herself, she's never _tried_ to kill herself, and she looks after my sister and I just fine. And, yes, I am well aware that, Oh, yeah, I don't have a father. So what? Loads of people don't have fathers or mothers or parents, at all. And loads of people are still alright people. Will there be any more ridiculous questions?"

"I suppose not," Persephone replied. "So tell me about school, then. What is it that troubles you about school?"

"Too much to begin with. Look, nobody bullies me, that's not it. I just think, sometimes, the world could be more tolerant. It is how it is, though. I can only do my best, I can't do that for the rest of the world. I'm down with that, now; I get it. You have to let some things go, that's all."

"What sort of things do you have to let go, for instance?" Persephone asked.

"For instance, I can't stop people being racist or prejudice. Maybe they'll change eventually, as they get older and meet more people; maybe not."

"Fair enough," she granted. "Perhaps we could talk more about this some other time, just the two of us?"

He shrugged.

"Tell me about your Empathy, then? Remember, you don't have to say anything if you're uncomfortable with doing so. And if you think I'm leading you too strongly in one direction, you tell me, okay?"

"It works better when I touch things," he said.

She nodded. "It works that way for a lot of Empaths."

"Sometimes, when someone's feeling a particular emotion pretty strongly, I can sorta feel it, too. But… different, not like it's mine, like it's theirs, but I'm kinda aware of it."

"That happens, too."

He shook his head. "I don't know why I got sick. Maybe it was just always going to happen."

"That's right, isn't it. Sometimes, things just happen. Can you tell me if you were channelling your abilities more strongly than usual before you had the seizure?"

"I was thinking about my maths homework." He smiled. "I don't know if that's channelling my abilities more strongly than usual."

She frowned, and glanced at Missy and Emily. "How is Snow, with school?"

"He's alright, I guess," Emily replied. "He's very smart."

"Do you think perhaps he has a bit of Pretender in him?"

Emily made a face. Slowly, she replied, "I don't know. I mean, how should I?"

"It may be possible," Missy added. "I'm a Pretender, and Snow's father was… well, you know that we were twins. In general, twins show the same expression as one another, for instance, Sydney and Jacob. My brother and I didn't. That doesn't mean Snow didn't inherit some degree of Pretending."

Emily stared at her as though to say, _Why are we just talking about this now? In front of these people who I don't even know, no less!_

Persephone glanced at Snow. "Alright, so I think the first thing we'll want to establish is your expression. If you're an Empath and a Pretender, or just an Empath."

"My mom's a Mediator," Snow told her.

Her eyes snapped to Emily. "Is she?"

Emily made a face at Snow. This wasn't about her! She glanced over at Persephone. "L- Snow's father thought I might be; I guess I thought it would be nice to be something other than… the Recessive!" she replied.

"Well, that's right," Persephone said. "And, for the record, I don't believe in Recessives."

That was clearly Raines's influence coming out, Missy thought. Not that her brother had helped at all; he'd always been far too friendly with T-Corp scripture for her liking. In her opinion, the only good Center employee was a stupid one, and one who was assured of their own superiority and that only they were right. The fact that her brother had even bothered to consider that T-Corp was anything but a stereotypical mob of savages, hadn't been the most warming thought. Which obviously, she thought, she could have easily blamed on Raines for feeding her brother all of his bullshit about Convergence. People who'd grown up in a situation like her brother had just didn't need to hear that sort of shit; it fucked them up even more than they were already fucked up, in her opinion. Thanks again, William, you good-for-nothing loony!

Of course, she herself believed in Convergence, and had good reason to, besides, but that didn't change the fact that a _good_ Center employee _didn't_! And they didn't stand for others spreading T-Corp lies, either!

Her brother had had the excuse that he'd gone on to become their T-Corp expert, but Raines had had no such excuse. It was obvious, to her, that he'd come out of T-Corp, that he'd been one of their little pets, but that, if anything, should have given him all the more cause to _shut his fucking mouth_! Apparently the crap had been hammered into him too heavily for it to ever really leave him. Even after he'd been sent for re-education, she knew he'd still thought that what T-Corp had taught him was the truth, and everything else was just lies, but lies that he would do best to perpetuate.

After all, to have Healed her mother after he'd shot her in the head and blown her brains out wasn't, by any stretch of the imagination, an easy feat. In fact, she was sure that it said a lot more about his indoctrination than he would have liked. The fact that he had so much as believed that he could do something like that, let alone that he had, said as much. She hadn't, however, believed a word of his nonsense about being their father. She'd clued on straight away that he was covering for someone, and, in her mind, that someone was Jacob Green.

Jacob, who had given him his position of Med Space Director; Jacob, who had taken the fall for Catherine when her plan had backfired, until, finally, there'd been no-one left to take the fall but Catherine and William themselves – and they'd devised their crazy plan – Jacob, who had probably known all along just how crazy they were and just how badly they would have fucked things over without his intervention. How well that had gone for him, she thought.

But neither Raines nor Jacob were the problem here, Snow was. Still, she had to wonder what kind of shit went through his head with all of the shit that had led up to him.

She wondered the same thing about herself, sometimes.

Persephone had taken out some cards, which she was quizzing Snow on, and Emily had gone to the bar to order herself an alcoholic drink.

She came back with a drink for Missy too, who took her vodka and orange without complaint.

It had just struck her that the person Jacob would have done absolutely anything for… was Sydney. His twin brother.

She sipped her vodka, and thought about that one.

Even when Jacob had still been around, there had been talk of something going on between William and he, but he'd never once made comment on that talk, not even once, as though it was okay for people to think he and Raines were somehow involved… if it took their interest away from Sydney.

Sydney had always been the quiet one of the two of them, but what had he been hiding behind that quietness, and why had Jacob thought he'd needed to be protected from people finding out about it?

* * *

After three vodka and oranges, and one vodka and Coke, Emily fell asleep in the car on the long drive home, and Missy was left alone to her thoughts. Snow was reading an e-book; she hadn't asked what it was he was reading. She wasn't in the mood to hear that it was some crap about maths.

She adjusted the vents to let some air in and drove.

They'd decided that Persephone would come to see them in a few days to spend some time with Snow, and she wasn't really looking forward to that. So much for it only being two hours, she thought, but at least Persephone's husband was still around at the end of those two hours; hers was off God knew where. Hopefully he'd be home soon, though, she told herself. She missed him.

"I didn't tell her one thing," Snow said, from the backseat, not looking up from his electronic reader.

"What's that?" she asked, still watching the road. Turning a corner, she frowned at the boy standing outside, and it dawned on her. The boy was Snow, except he wasn't really outside, he was still in the car, sitting on the backseat – he was projecting. "Do you think you're going to tell her?"

"I don't know yet," he replied evenly.

She sighed. Apparently he was an Empath, and apparently he wasn't half bad. She had a feeling she'd have preferred if he'd been of a lower class. The companies who operated under the Triumvirate's protection were always looking for high class Empaths. She supposed the kindest thing she'd ever be able to do for Snow now was to put a bullet in his head; she just hoped it wouldn't come to that. And, of course, it was all Lyle's fault. She had a feeling he'd known exactly what he was, and that the best thing for someone like that would just be to never have children. Of course, why would he even care about that; it wasn't as though he had been able to care about anyone but himself, anyway.

"It was either him or you," Snow told her. "Why waste the resources on Healing you when there was no need for it?"

She forced herself not to look away from the road. "What are you talking about?"

"They wanted it to be you, you know. But he said, well, his daughter had been an Empath, maybe they'd get lucky with this one, too. If the child was an Empath, it would be useful to them and, if the need called for it, to T-Corp as well. And, with you, there was no guarantee you would even be able to be Healed well enough to be able to have kids. But I think the Tower just wanted an excuse to have you sent away for re-education. You're the Daughter of Catherine Parker; you'd have made such a fine trophy on their wall. To have Catherine Parker's daughter on their side again, and not just in name, but honestly, truly on their side! How marvellous that would be!"

She glared at the road ahead of her. She didn't believe that.

"I guess that would have ruined all of their plans for you," Snow finished.

"And what plans are those?" she growled. She wasn't angry at him, she was just angry.

"I haven't figured that part out yet. I'll get back to you when I do, I guess," he replied.

And then there was silence, and just the road, and her thoughts. Though Snow didn't know it, her brother was still out there, and most certainly still plotting away at making his plans for her come true.


	6. Chapter 6

_Three weeks later_

Maria scrunched up her eyes and opened them again, hoping that when she did so Shaun might magically appear in front of her; she had something to say to him. But, just like the ten other times she'd done that same thing, nothing happened; Shaun did not magically appear.

She'd wanted to tell him that giving up their friendship just because their guardians thought it was the best thing for them was just bullshit, that it was just like what had happened with his parents. She wanted to say she was sorry for going off at him, that even though she'd been mad, she shouldn't have lost it the way she had. She wanted to say she still wanted them to be friends – but she was always alone.

She already knew what he would say besides, he would say,_ If I had truly cared for you at all, Maria, I would have waited until we could be together in clear conscience; I would have thought about you, not just me! I wouldn't have led you on the way I did._

She wanted to tell him, _You're just a kid, honey!_ but she'd only be talking to herself.

* * *

At the very top of the building, standing at the very edge of the ledge, it seemed like a long way down, like quite a tall building, he thought. He hummed something Eartha Kitt, which became something Corinne Bailey Rae, and ended up as _99 Red Balloons_.

He turned away from the edge of the building, and stepped down from the ledge. This time, he was alone. There was no-one that he might have frightened, no-one to care if he hadn't cared.

Today, he was working in an office, working with numbers. Right now, he was on his break.

As a rule, he thought that he might have quite easily have fallen in love with this city and its people, with its diversity, but not today. Today, he missed a girl who hated him, a girl he'd never been in love with, in real life. He missed the children, their loudness and sadness and laughter, he missed her smile.

He missed how he'd used to care about things.

* * *

The children were full of laughter; Missy watched them from a short distance away, playing on the park's play equipment, sitting on a bench with Emily, who was pretending to be busy reading a romance novel, though she hadn't turned a page in quite some time.

"Do you mind if I sit here?" someone asked, making her turn to look. She stared at the man for a long time, struggling to make sense of what she was seeing. She suddenly felt… defenceless. She needed her gun; even a knife would have helped.

Snapping her book shut, Emily tossed her head, "Go for your life," she replied shortly. "I'm Emily."

"Alex," the man replied politely.

Emily laughed. "My brother knew an Alex; bit of the twisty type, if you know what I mean!"

"I do believe that I do, Emily."

Emily frowned at Missy. "Missy," she introduced.

"We've met," Alex replied.

Emily's frown deepened, then it just disappeared. "Oh," she said. "I guess you're that Alex; the… one with the problems." She shot a short glance to Kit and Whitney, then returned her attention to Alex. "For someone who's supposed to be dead, you don't look… really dead," she commented lamely.

"Barbara has her fair share of allies."

"Barbara?"

"The chairwoman of the Center's Alabama branch, Alex's home branch," Missy spoke up finally.

"That's the one," Alex agreed.

"You're from Alabama?" Emily asked, slightly disbelieving.

"Apparently."

"So you believe in Healers?" Emily said, drawing a warning look from Missy.

"Well, it would be unfair of me to say that I didn't, I think," Alex replied.

"The Alabama branch has Healers, then?"

"Nowadays, they do. Before they acquired their own, they'd take them out on loan from the Tower."

"Did Blue Cove ever do that? Loan a Healer?"

Alex sat down beside Missy, frowning. "Blue Cove wasn't always… in the Tower's good graces. I don't believe the Tower would have trusted Blue Cove with a Healer."

"And Blue Cove didn't have any of their own Healers?"

"At one point, they did acquire a Healer of their own."

"But?"

"He killed himself," Missy interrupted coldly. "What do you want, Alex?"

"What? Why?" Emily asked.

"Apparently, even death was preferable to helping the enemy," Missy replied.

"Blue Cove had a great many secrets that the Tower knew nothing about. Personally, I didn't see it as any business of mine to inform the Tower of those secrets. It would have been rather unwise, would it not? Blue Cove was my home, whether I wanted it to be or not, and revealing its secrets to those who were less than invested in its best interests, seemed like rather a foolish move; self-destructive, if you will."

"You think Blue Cove really did have a Healer?" Emily asked.

Alex made a face; she was being rather ignorant, wasn't she? "Of course they did!"

Right at that moment, before Missy could press her point that Alex tell her what he wanted, they were interrupted by the arrival of a little girl who Alex stood up to greet, then knelt down and hugged.

Both Missy and Emily decided that the little girl knew who he was; she seemed happy to have a hug from him. "Where's mommy?" Alex asked, and that was when it occurred to them: the little girl thought that Alex was her father.

"She's taking a phone call," the seven-year-old replied.

Suddenly, it struck Missy that the little girl seemed familiar; she'd seen her in a picture in a magazine the last time she'd been to the doctor's with Kit and Whitney: Coco Cleary. She was Shannen Cleary's daughter.

"It's _her_," Coco relayed, lowering her voice.

"Oh dear," Alex replied. "Though, I must give her that, she is persistent."

"Too persistent; it's _creepy_!" Coco answered.

"Well, it has been a long time, baby, and-"

Coco rolled her eyes. "They need closure. I know, I know! But sometimes it's an attitude, too. Sometimes, you don't ever find out what happened; sometimes you just have to let go and say, Well, even though you don't know, you'd like to think it's okay; and then… maybe it can be. If she's dead, then she's probably let go of it by now; Patience is only hurting herself and her family by hanging on to it, too."

"I understand what you're saying, Coco, but sometimes it's easier said than done."

Coco nodded, frowning in thought, "I know." Her eyes widened. "Did you get mommy anything nice?" she cried suddenly.

Alex smiled. "Am I not nice enough?" he asked.

Coco shook her head.

Alex patted her hair.

She made a face at him, then turned away and ran off; presumably to bring her mother over.

Missy suppressed an ill expression. She did not want to see Shannen Cleary today! "How did you hook up with that she-demon?" she remarked. "Who thought the two of you would be a cute couple? The chairwoman of Bama?"

Alex smiled at her. "Contrary to what you might think, Shannen and I care for one another a great deal."

Missy laughed shortly. "And I'll bet you've told Shannen _all_ about your squeaky clean past!"

"Some of it," Alex replied calmly.

"It seems like we both have our secrets," Missy told him.

Alex glanced at Emily for a moment.

Missy's eyes narrowed.

"I would agree," Alex said.

"If you don't tell mine, I won't tell yours," Missy told him simply.

Alex sighed and nodded, "Fair enough."

Not a moment later, Coco returned… with her mother.

Shannen frowned at Missy and Emily, before glancing at Alex for explanation.

"Shannen, Mairead and Chloë," Alex introduced. "Mairead is an interior designer, and Chloë…"

"I am, too," Emily replied cheerfully.

Shannen nodded, casting a doubtful look in Alex's direction; she didn't need an interior designer.

"It was nice meeting you all," Emily piped up. "We've really got to be going, unfortunately."

Missy glanced at her watch, then sighed. "It does seem that way," she agreed. "Maybe we'll see you 'round some time."

"We're really just passing through," Shannen told them; clearly, she wasn't happy about Alex telling everyone that they were together.

"Do have a pleasant afternoon," Alex told them, before they turned and left, making their way toward the play equipment.

Emily glanced at Missy cautiously. "Do you trust him?"

"Hell, no!"

"Should we… do something, then?"

Missy frowned suddenly at the thought of the 'something' Emily had mentioned.

"Missy?"

"Do what?" Missy asked.

"You have a gun," Emily reminded her quietly.

"He has a daughter," Missy said, not particularly moved.

Emily shook her head fractionally; how did that change anything? They'd probably be doing the kid a favour doing away with him. "You don't even know he's her _real_ father!" she hissed.

"He is," Missy replied in a voice that left no room for negotiation.

"How do you _know_?" Emily protested; the no-negotiation tone had obviously failed to work its charm on her.

"I'm a Pretender, Em," she answered shortly. "If you'd have taken a proper look at her, you'd have seen it, too. He's her father; Cleary's her mother."

"He's cracked."

"That's not the point."

"You want him to make her just as crazy as he is, is that what you want?" Emily whispered hotly.

Missy stopped walking and turned to face her properly. "She's a kid, Alex isn't going to do anything to her."

"Bullshit!"

Missy started walking again; if Emily didn't want to believe her, then so be it. When Emily finally caught up to her, she said quietly, "If you want it taken care of, do it yourself!"

"This is rubbish!" Emily shot angrily, but that was the last she said until they got home.

* * *

The moment she was dropped off home, Emily hurried to retrieve her cell phone from the charger in her bedroom and sat down on the bed to dial Jarod's number. When he picked up, she told him about how they'd met Alex at the park.

Jarod listened without comment, then he said, "It seems like Missy has it under control, Em."

Emily glared at the wall because she couldn't glare at him. She told him to have a good afternoon, and hung up. Then she went to the kitchen and sat down with a yoghurt.

Farfalla had begun school not long ago, and the house was empty.

She stood up and walked to the lounge room to switch the television on.

* * *

The kids were getting their messy clothes together for the wash when Missy's cell phone rang and she ran to collect it from the kitchen counter where she'd left it when she'd come in. It was Jarod; apparently Emily had told him about their unexpected meeting with Alex earlier in the day. _That was quick_, she thought.

She spent half an hour talking to Jarod about it – he was quite worried – but, in the end, she was able to convince him that it was alright; she had it covered.

She hung up and put the wash on, supplying the kids with their favourite packet juices and a small bowl of sliced apple each, which they sat down in the kitchen to eat.

She had a feeling Emily underestimated Alex. Well, it was hardly surprising – she didn't know him, after all. Perhaps Alex had realised that he didn't just have all the time in the world, and he'd woken up to himself; perhaps he'd realised that, in the end, it was family that was really important in this world.

Still, she had to wonder whether Cleary knew what she had been getting herself in for with Alex, and, if so, what her agenda was. It was a troubling thought, especially if Cleary figured out who Emily and she really were. She wondered how well Coco would be able to do without her mother.

* * *

"Don't tell me those women work for your mother, Alex," Shannen breathed, trying to keep her voice down in case Coco was listening to their conversation.

"I don't know where you would get that idea," Alex replied. "I just met them today."

"BS!" Shannen snapped.

Coco looked up from her crossword puzzle book to ask Alex a question, which he answered before returning his attention to Shannen.

"I'm sick and tired of the only thing I ever hear from you being lies, Alex," she told him seriously.

"I'm not lying, Shannen."

She laughed quietly. "Yeah, you are!"

He sighed.

Shannen pointed to the door. "Just go! Tell Coco something came up – and go!"

* * *

"Why do you have to go, daddy?" Coco complained.

"I have an important meeting, baby," Alex told her.

She made a face. "No you don't!"

"Yes I do, dear."

"You're lying!" she accused.

"Don't say that, I have no reason to lie to you, baby."

She narrowed her eyes darkly. "Mommy thinks you're cheating on her, doesn't she? She said you had to go!"

"Don't blame your mother, baby."

The little girl stared at him, half in shock. "You're cheating on mommy!"

He looked at Shannen. She'd taken out a cooking book she'd bought a while ago at a market and was looking through it for something to make for dinner. If she noticed he was looking at her, she pretended not to. She was immersed in the book.

He sighed. "I'll see you soon, darling, I promise. Do I get a hug?"

Coco crossed her arms. "No!"

He nodded. "Be good to your mom, alright. Don't be a terror, and have fun."

The little girl put her hands over her ears. She didn't want to hear! She turned away so she wouldn't have to see him leave, and walked over to her mom to look at the cooking book with her.

Standing up, Shannen went to put one of her Jennifer Love Hewitt CDs on, and skipped to track 5, _Don't Push the River_. She went to make a hot chocolate for them both; putting a chocolate frog on the side of Coco's saucer.

"Where's the wrapper, mommy?" Coco asked, eyeing her chocolate frog dubiously.

Shannen nodded to the brown paper wrapping it had come in; she'd got a dozen of them from a market someplace.

Coco took a cautious bite of her chocolate frog. "It's nice, mommy," she said excitedly.

Shannen smiled; that was nice. Coco didn't notice that her mother's smile wasn't quite sincere.

* * *

The kids had wanted pizza for dinner – pizza from _the shop_, they'd protested – so she was sitting at one of the benches, waiting for the pizza to be ready. She'd dropped the kids off at Em's; they could all have pizza together.

She was busy reading one of those little pamphlets that the store put out, when she noticed that someone had sat down beside her, and wished, for the second time that day, that she had her gun – even if she couldn't use it (_in a pizza store?_), or had no intention of doing so.

"What are you doing with Lin Sanford?" Alex asked.

"Are you following me?" she snapped, trying to keep the hate in her voice to a minimum; it came out as irritation, which she decided she could settle for.

"You have to know-"

"In fact, _no_, I _don't know_ what you're talking about, Alex!" she growled.

"Your brother's… partner," Alex replied.

"My brother's dead!"

He tossed his head. "None of us saw that coming."

"Excuse me?" she snapped.

"She's supposed to have been dead, Miss Parker. He's supposed to have taken care of her; she was a T-Corp infiltrator."

"You're so full of bullshit, Alex!" she told him coldly. "Emily is Jarod's sister; not some T-Corp operative!"

Alex frowned and looked away from her, muttering something she was pretty sure was something offensive in Russian.

She smiled, sinisterly amused. Since when had Alex thought bad language was okay; wasn't that 'savage'?

"She was your brother's Convergence partner, and she was a T-Corp operative," Alex replied. "She did her work well on your brother."

Missy hissed, "Emily is not-!"

Alex took out his smart phone and passed it to her.

She stared at a photograph of a teenaged girl; a very familiar teenager. She felt anger and sadness well inside her, at once. Alex might have called this girl Lin, but she'd called her Mimi, and Mimi had been her best friend. The best friend she'd killed when the car they'd stolen had skidded on black ice and they'd both very nearly wound up dead. She'd lost her unborn baby and her best friend; for a long, long time, she'd believed that she'd done a stupid, stupid thing for some random stupid young person's reason – until, finally, she'd conceded that Molly was real and that she needed to be seen to.

Molly had been the alter T-Corp had created for her; it had been so, so tough, but she'd eventually succeeded in integrating Molly back into her personality. Mimi's one little lie – that it had been nothing more than a child's adventurous fancy; monsters weren't real, they only existed in fairy stories – told with the best of intentions, was finally shattered. But, yet, she could not believe that Mimi had been alive when she'd imparted her little lie, whisper quiet. She had been dead; she'd come back all that way, to make it better for her; because she'd loved her. She had seen Mimi die, after all, she had seen her die a death no person could possibly come back from.

And now, here was Alex, telling her that her best friend was alive, and that she had known her for years, without clueing on. That she hadn't only lived, but that she'd lived only to be put through more shit, shit that she'd never deserved in the first place!

In her mind, she just kept thinking, _Cooper_. That had been Jarod's mother's maiden name; that had been Mimi's name.

She didn't realise she'd started to cry until she felt Alex put his arms around her. She didn't even feel the slightest urge to kill him, she just wanted to cry, and possibly, that was the worst feeling of all. So she cried.

"You have to understand that those who could be trusted had never particularly trusted me. As hard as I tried, it all amounted to nothing. I tried, for what your mother had tried to do for us, but I was… it was as though I'd never said anything at all. You were strong, and do you see, do you see how well you've done? In many ways, Jarod and you, you two are the best of us, the best of us all, of everything that has been done, to all of those who have suffered and surrendered. You almost make it all worthwhile – just to be here today, to be who you are today, you make it all… tolerable. Nothing can make it right, but nothing can make you two any less right. You've done so, so good, darling, hold onto that. You can still do so, the two of you, together. There is a lot still you have to give to the world; every person is one more person. And every good person is a reason to fight, a reason not to despair. We are not all just another piece on their game board, some of us can think and feel beyond just ourselves, some of us can see the whole picture."

Missy sniffed. "Alex, shut up!"

Alex nodded, and took his arms from around her.

Glancing to the monitor screen, she saw that the order for Missy was _ready_.

"I believe in you," Alex told her quietly, and then he was gone, and she was standing at the counter, waiting to pay for her order, waiting to go home to her family and have tea.

As she handed over the money for the pizzas, it occurred to her that she'd never asked Alex about the mysterious Healer, she'd never asked what its interest had been in Emily – or her – to have Healed Em, not just once, but possibly four times. She knew now what had to happen. She needed a Healer to tell her that Emily had never been Healed, she needed a Healer to tell her – not so much in words – that it had been the mysterious Healer.

On an aside, she'd have liked a Healer to be able to tell her that Alex was mental, but she wasn't sure that that would be the Healer's diagnosis.

* * *

Sitting at the table, eating pizza with her family, she realised how blind she'd been never to have seen it before. She knew, too, that it had been because she'd needed to believe that Mimi had died in Canada, that she hadn't left her there – with those monsters!

A slow twisting, stabbing pain invaded her chest, throughout the evening. A pain that told her that Michelle might have told her that Mimi had lived; Michelle, who'd once been one of her trainers in T-Corp; Michelle, who can't not have known.

Just as the pain, she realised slowly that perhaps Michelle had heard of Mimi's demise at the hands of the Center and had decided it kindest not to pass along that particular piece of information, or perhaps she hadn't been game enough to drive any more of a wedge been her twin and her, perhaps she'd realised the tenuous space she occupied, as both a former Center employee and a former T-Corp employee. (Of which the Center, and Sydney, knew nothing of.) Perhaps, she had been thinking of her Nicky, her Nicholas, her son. (Her little monster child.) Perhaps she'd been thinking of the pain and horror they could have put him through if they'd so decided that doing so could be a spot of fun for them, with the added bonus of it being a lesson to all of those others from T-Corp who didn't think they took their shit seriously! (The oversight with Catherine had been a slip, but Catherine had been taken care of, and they had returned, as determined as ever!)

She got up to refill her glass of wine, and tried to let go of all of the rubbish for just a few moments; it was the past, the past, and nothing more. A moral lesson, perhaps, but not a past to live in.

She sipped her wine slowly and wondered how she was going to find a Healer to take a look at Em. Angelo might have been Raines's son, but he'd inherited none of his Healing abilities. He'd inherited his mother's Reaper expression, just as Nicholas had.

She wondered, perhaps, if even though Angelo hadn't inherited any Healing ability, if he might still be able to tell if Emily had been Healed. Perhaps because he was a Reaper _and_ an Empath, he could tell something like that.

Or perhaps he'd know of another Healer.


	7. Chapter 7

Her name was Jolene; she was a Healer. She knew Alex because they both worked for Alabama's Center branch; she was a secretary. She was married to a cartoonist and they had a five-year-old son. Her son's name was Hewitt; he wasn't a Healer. She knew of T-Corp scripture, and, if she was to give a reason for her son not inheriting the anomaly from her, she'd have to say it was because her husband and she didn't have Convergence. She didn't think it mattered so much, though; she loved her husband. She wasn't about to give up on their love just because someone came along she felt some cosmic connection with. Hey, sure, they could be friends, but she wasn't leaving her husband for him, no way.

The company didn't know she was a Healer, just as she hadn't known it herself. She'd only found out a couple of years ago when the company had realised they didn't have her DNA down on file and, actually, they'd have liked it, thanks. It was Alex who'd covered up that she had the anomaly, in exchange for her 'friendship.' So now they were supposed to be friends, allies.

She'd heard about him, about his doubtful character – she'd looked into it in a bit more depth, actually, after Alex had come to her with his proposition – and she'd thought, _Shit, do I want to get on this loony's wrong side?_ She'd decided, of course, that she didn't really want to do that. And he had said he wouldn't tell the others; her son wouldn't be dragged in for numerous horrible, invasive tests; she wouldn't be dragged in for numerous horrible, invasive tests. She'd decided, for her loved ones, she could deal with being 'friends' with a criminally insane lunatic. What else _could_ she do?

She'd never been trained under another Healer, but Alex had found enough reading material for her to study that she'd decided that if she'd had the choice again, she'd have chosen _not_ to be a Healer; not that she had chosen. Though, according to Alex, she had. Alex was full of crazy things like that: apparently, she thought, he'd chosen to be a lunatic; that sounded right. She wondered what spiritual lesson he was supposed to gain out of that.

Of course, he'd said, spiritually, in all probability, he wasn't crazy; it was just a slight problem in the interface between spirit and mind. She'd told him to tell his shrink that and see how fast they dosed him; shrinks didn't believe in mind, it was just brain with those lot. Where he'd gotten this spirit rubbish was beyond her! (In his defence, he had replied that everyone had to believe in something, didn't they? _Fair enough_, she'd thought,_ yeah, everyone's gotta believe in something, but it ain't worth believing in if it don't make you a better someone._)

Now, she stood on Missy's door, waiting for this Missy woman to come to the door. (She'd just rung the buzzer.)

Once, she'd started a conversation with Alex about how she thought this DNA business wasn't the be all, end all; it had turned out to be the wrong thing to say. She didn't need to know about how many genetic faults humans had, or that some people attributed this to the fact that they'd been 'engineered.' Mostly, she hadn't needed to know that he was one of those aliens-are-real people. She really couldn't care less if aliens were real or not, so long as they left her alone. She was an Earthling through and through; she didn't dream about living on the moon or Mars, Earth had enough wonders to last her several lifetimes over, thank you.

She sung Rob Thomas's _Her Diamonds_ quietly as she waited for Missy to get the door, and leaned over to press the buzzer again.

_Missy's probably beaming down from the mother ship_, she thought humorously, and smiled as she sung. If she was a friend of Alex's, anything was possible, she supposed.

A while later, the door swung open and Missy stood in the doorway. She supposed the woman was Missy. She held out her hand, "I'm an associate of Alex Loginov."

Missy merely frowned. "I don't know anyone by that name," she said.

"From Alabama," Jolene added.

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Missy asked.

"Jolene Butler. Are you Missy?"

The brunette woman nodded; she was Missy. "Loginov? As in, Barb Loginov?"

Jolene nodded shortly. "Yes, Barb is Alex's mother. Apparently, Alex isn't to be trusted… around women. I might have pointed out that some of the women working for the company aren't all that trustworthy themselves, but I don't think that's what she wanted to hear. He has… _mental problems_, is how she put it. I'm, ah, I'm a secretary. Apparently, he's that trustworthy that she had to invite us all to a meeting to tell us how _un_trustworthy he is. The biscuits were nice, though. Let me know if my Alex sounds anything like your Alex…"

"He's not _my_ Alex," Missy breathed, then stepped aside to let her in.

Jolene laughed, "He's not mine, either, darlin'! I'm happily married, thankies."

"I did not ask Alex for his help, and I don't know why he sent you," Missy cleared up, as they headed along the hall.

"I'm a Healer," Jolene replied.

Missy kept walking.

Jolene had expected _something_, at least, but with this woman: _nothing_.

"You-?"

"I know what a Healer is," Missy merely said. "How do you take your coffee?"

"No coffee," Jolene replied. "Tea. Earl Grey, if you have." The colour faded from Jolene's blue eyes, leaving them dull and grey.

Missy stepped clear from her. "No thank you. Alex didn't send you here for me."

"No?" Jolene asked, her eyes already changing back to blue. "He didn't say it would be for someone else. He just said that I should come here and ask for you. Is this person…?"

"Female, a few years younger than me," Missy replied.

Jolene nodded. "And… is she sick?"

"No."

"No?"

"I'd like to know if, in your opinion, she's been Healed before."

Jolene nodded. "Ah, I see."

"That's it," Missy added.

"That's it," Jolene echoed.

* * *

Emily wasn't pleased, when she discovered the reason she'd been asked 'round. If Missy hadn't taken her arm, Jolene was sure she would have walked right out again. It was important for them to know, Missy told her. Jolene had to agree. She'd want to know if she'd been probed by some creepy Healer's Healer vibes, too. She meant it as a bit of a joke – she had aliens on the brain, unfortunately – but apparently it wasn't half as funny as it had sounded in her head.

Anything she learned today was, of course, completely confidential, she assured them both. The company didn't know that she was a Healer, exactly, and that was how she liked it. Alex had taught her a bit about blocking, and she generally steered clear of Empaths. Creepy little cookies, that was for sure. She wasn't so comfy with the idea of some Healer's Healy probe, but the idea of Empath mind probes was an even more uncomfortable one for her. Hell no, thankies! Alex was bad enough, and he wasn't anything more spectacular than criminally insane and untrustworthy with women, as far as she knew.

They left the kitchen and went into the lounge, after they'd all agreed. Emily sat down on the sofa. She didn't take her eyes off Jolene's. Even when her eyes changed colour, she didn't so much as blink. _Another weird one_, Jolene thought. But maybe it was just how freaked out she was.

When she was in the zone, Jolene reached out for Emily's hands. "It's okay," she told Emily, "all I'll be doing is holding your hands, you won't even feel-" She frowned. "I'm having a bit of trouble getting anything from you, love. If you can just relax, that'll make it much easier."

Emily took a deep breath and let it out again.

"Try holding it for the count of four," Jolene told her. "It helps."

Emily did as she'd instructed.

"Would you prefer if you had something to listen to, some relaxing music, maybe, a favourite relaxation recording?"

"No," Emily replied.

"Okay."

Jolene glanced at Missy. "Nothing, so far," she reported, and frowned, returning her gaze to Emily's hands. "Do you have children?" she asked, casually. "I have a son, Hewitt. He's five. He just started school. He loves it, can't get enough of it. He always wants to be there early. I guess it's the other kids. He has so many friends, it's a wonder my husband can keep up with all their names. I can't."

She noticed Missy shake her head at Emily; it was none of this woman's business, frankly.

"Yes, I have two kids," Emily replied.

Jolene nodded. All of that seemed to fit with what she was getting. She sighed. "Well, Emily, I think it's safe to say you've never been Healed. There's absolutely nothing to worry about, love. False alarm, it seems."

Emily tentatively took her hands back.

Jolene's eyes returned to blue. "And that's all?"

Missy walked over and held out her hand. "That's all," she replied, shaking the other woman's hand. She wasn't afraid that Jolene would get anything off her, her eyes had changed back to grey, signalling that she was no longer in the 'mode,' and she had a feeling that Jolene, for all her good intentions (or not), was nowhere near the Healer that William Raines had once been. Now she had to wonder, if Raines truly had Healed Emily, if he was the mysterious Healer. She might have volunteered that Jolene pose as a new friend of Emily's in order for her to meet Harmony and perhaps glean a little from her, but she didn't trust Jolene quite that much. If it had been Alex, perhaps, (she had something to hold over him now), but Alex was a Pretender, not a Healer.

They had another coffee (Jolene had another tea), talked about the weather, and then Jolene left in her new, dark blue Mercedes-Benz.

* * *

Missy turned a serious glance on Emily and asked, "Are you absolutely positive it was Raines who Healed you, Em, because we need to be certain."

Emily shook her head. "I'm sure, but… I don't even know what this is all about! You haven't told me anything! Are you sure we can trust Jolene?"

"Go with it, Em, just go with it. We trust her for now. What this is about? Jolene says you haven't been Healed, and now here you are, saying that you have. So, someone's either mistaken, or this is starting to get… complicated."

"Complicated how?" Emily asked, not following her at all.

"Well, I guess you're fairly new to the Healer scene, Em, but those of us who go back a while, we know that, basically, there's a couple of Healers that are held in higher regard than the average Healer. And, yes, that goes for the Center, as well. First off, there's Nash, from T-Corp scripture, T-Corp's Noah, _Oh, I'm so in awe!_ Nothing like a spot of sarcasm to brighten up the day! Then there's the Daughter of Nash, inventive names these guys have, I can tell you, AKA Blake. She's generally regarded as something special, along with her old man. Of course, there's the T-Corp family Healers. Mmm, the family who runs the joint are actually Healers! Nice! Like to get my hands on one of them! Start a war! Always fun!" She laughed. "Bad joke… Moving on, then we have the Mysterious Healer?"

"The Mysterious Healer?" Emily interrupted, suitably sceptical.

Missy tilted her head. "_The Mysterious Healer._ The Mysterious Healer… well, nobody really knows if they're Center, T-Corp, free world, or one of the smaller rivals'. Big mystery. Even bigger mystery: How does a Healer Heal without leaving any trace of a person ever having been Healed? None, _nada_, nil? Hmm, mysterious! _Ciencia ficción_!"

Emily shook her head at her, smiling. "So, how can a Healer Heal with leaving a… trace thingy?"

"No idea," Missy replied. "Which brings us to you."

"Why me?"

"Because I have a feeling it's not the first time you've been Healed by this… Mysterious Healer," Missy said.

* * *

"You don't think it was Raines who Healed me?" Emily asked.

"No, I don't think Raines was the Mysterious Healer," Missy replied, with a sigh. Time to get serious, she supposed, though she wasn't all that keen on the idea. It was a good thing the kids had stayed over at Margaret and Harmony's. (Charles was in town; he hardly saw his grandkids, neither Missy nor Emily had objected to the kids seeing him.) "Look, Em, I only just found out the other day, and I think it's only right that I tell you, too, seeing as this is something that concerns you."

Emily stirred a spoon of sugar into her black coffee and waited for Missy to tell her the big secret. She didn't usually take sugar in her coffee, but she was after something sweet and she didn't feel like casually popping up out of her seat to take a quick look through Missy's fridge. "Found out from whom?" she asked.

"I think we knew each other before," Missy told her, as though she hadn't heard her question. "I think were we friends. Your name was Mimi. There… there was an accident, Em. It was bad. We both nearly died. I… I thought you _had_ died. I never would have connected you to Mimi if Alex, the total creep, hadn't set me on the right path. Em, the school we were at, it wasn't right… it was a T-Corp facility, for recruiting and training operatives. Not all the girls there were right for it, but someone had obviously decided that we were. You… you were only trying to save us. You told me what was going on, Em. _You_ did. They couldn't brainwash you! You were the best! You were amazing! So we took a car. We were going to get away, Em. You had this… contact, who'd somehow managed to get their hands on a serum that would deactivate the biomechanical tags they'd given us. We had decided to get away, and use the serum once we knew we were far enough away. But it was winter, and there was ice on the road. We just… didn't see, Em. But I swear, you were gone!"

She put her hand over Emily's, which was still holding the spoon, sitting beside her mug on the table.

Emily was perfectly still.

"I saw you die, Emily."

Finally, Emily asked, "Then why aren't I dead?"

"Here's where we come to the Healer. Someone who can Heal without leaving any trace that a person was ever Healed; without ever having to _touch_ you. For some reason, this Healer decided that it was our lucky day."

"You think they're someone we know?" she asked, not entirely convinced of Missy's story yet. If she'd gotten her information from Alex, she wasn't going to throw herself off a cliff over it.

"Or maybe, someone who knows us; someone we've never had any reason to take much notice of."

"Maybe it was your dad. Your real dad, you know," Emily suggested.

Missy stared at her for a second. "I don't think so," she finally said. "Raines always said he was our re- my real dad. I just don't think he's the one we're looking for."

"Looking for?"

"Figuratively speaking," Missy clarified.

"You don't think they even worked at the Center?" Emily asked.

Missy took her hand from Emily. "No, I don't," she agreed.

"Maybe they did. Maybe it was Sydney."

"What?"

"Lyle said his daughter named her toy thing Sydney. Didn't he used to call Sydney Gramps. I think Jarod said that he did, didn't he? Maybe he thought Sydney was your father? Maybe Sydney… maybe, because I had Convergence with Lyle, he thought it would be bad if I died, and, because you are his daughter, he obviously wouldn't want you to die."

Missy nodded. "I see what you're getting at but I just don't think Sydney's a Healer, Emily. I mean, I guess he could be my dad, but he's not a Healer. Wouldn't he have Healed Jacob, given the chance?"

"Maybe he didn't have the chance," Emily suggested.

"I find that highly unlikely," Missy commented. "And why not Heal Angelo? Or Catherine? Why did it have to be Raines?"

Emily shook her head. Like Missy had said, she wasn't really down with this Healer thing yet. "About… what you were saying… about us. I can't really say 'yay' or 'nay,' I'm afraid, to confirm or deny your… findings; my memory's a bit of a blank when it comes to my teens. It seems a little-"

"Extreme," Missy interrupted. "No, no trust me, Em, nothing is a little extreme when you get mixed up with these loons. What we really should do is ask Margaret. She'd know if you ever went by the alias Mimi Cooper or not; she'd have been the one who enrolled you in boarding school. We've got to ask her, before we go doing anything else."


	8. Chapter 8

"Do you believe in angels?"

The two women stood up and spun around to stare at the woman standing in the doorway.

"Charles is back in town, so… I'm here, too," Zoe said. Jarod had said she'd been travelling with Charles; she vaguely recalled meeting her at the wedding.

Emily hurried around the table to hug her. "I missed you, Zoe."

Zoe sighed. "You know how it is," she replied. She nodded to Missy, "Hi."

Missy remained by the kitchen table, without comment.

"I heard about your brother," Zoe began, "but I guess doing stupid things was always his forte. What I mean about the angels is, I don't believe in angels, for real, or anything, but I think I know where Kyle got the angel thing from. Jarod said he believed in angels, you know, magical, glowing beings; so creepy, if you ask me." She nodded. "Anyway, I saw it, too."

"Saw what?" Missy asked, finally.

"The 'angel'," she replied. "It wasn't a _real_ angel."

"You saw a magical, glowing being?" Missy asked, incredulous.

Reaching up to get a mug down from the cupboard for Zoe, Emily grinned.

Zoe sighed. "Yeah, genius, it was your creeptastic brother. Apparently it wasn't only your mother who was handy with the telekinesis. Jarod _swears_ she broke this light once – with nothing more than the power of her mind!" She laughed. "Not that I don't believe him; I'm not dissing what he said, but… you've got to admit: glowing, levitating – that brother of yours sure needed help! And I don't think he could pick and choose when he… Healed people. Pretty sucky that he couldn't Heal Jimmy, huh! His best friend! I mean, if it had been me, I'd have totally wanted to make it right. You can only stay mad at a person for so long, after all."

Missy shook her head. For what it was worth, she was taking Zoe's spiel with a grain of salt.

* * *

"So, why do you think Kyle believed in angels?" Emily asked, passing Zoe a mug of coffee.

"Because he saw one," Zoe answered. "Well, what he thought was one."

"An angel?" Emily asked.

Missy shook her head. "She thinks Lyle was this Healer we've been talking about." She laughed.

"I heard," Emily replied.

"What I don't get," Missy said suddenly, "is when you met Lyle to be able to see him… supposably Healing someone."

"Not someone," Zoe corrected. "The two of you. I guess he needed the space." She brushed at her hair. "I was born in a Center facility in Canada, okay, that was how I was able to be there to see creep boy in his creep zone. Kyle saw it, too. He asked me what I was doing outside at such an hour. I didn't know it was a _person_! I thought it was… a hallucination. The cold, maybe, I don't know. It just seemed way too… aliens have landed."

"You were born in a Center facility?" Missy repeated. Warning bells had just sounded in her mind; a _Center_ facility!

"My twin sister and I, yes. That's why they finally murdered her; she was going to expose them. When I found out she had died, I ran away, but I should have… I should have gone with her, by rights. We thought we had them tricked; we thought they didn't know she'd gone. It seemed like the plan was perfect, but I guess, in real life, no plan is ever perfect. The point is, yes, I was born in a Center facility in Canada, and yes, I am a Pretender; untrained, mind you. I was trained as a nurse, my sister as a biologist." She sighed heavily. "I hate talking about her, you know, cos I miss her so much. She was, like," she laughed, "my other half. Zoe was her name; I guess it made me feel closer to her after she died. It was only when I met Jarod, and Sydney told him about those girls in that accident, that it started to make sense what I had seen in the forest that night. I knew a bit about Healers, of course, the facility had a program to capture them by devious means."

"All this time-!" Emily began, in a tone that finally made Missy take her eyes of Zoe.

Zoe frowned at the sudden accusing tone in Emily's voice. "Wh- About…" She shook her head. "Damn it, Em, yes I knew, but I didn't know what remembering could possibly do to you! Why would I risk that? You'd been a T-Corp operative! Y- You'd been through all of that shit, and you expect me to just heap that back on you like that! Bullshit, Em! I'm your friend, not some psycho! Even your crazy boy didn't do that! Tell me I'm fucking wrong, Em! Tell me he said something!" She laughed. "If he cared for anyone, Em, it was you! But not even he told you, did he? He was… he was the fucking mysterious Healer, but even he knew there was shit you didn't mess with! Damn it, Emily!"

She turned on the spot, running a hand over her hair. "You're really hurting me, Em. Fuck, what do you want me to say? Do you want me to say I stopped them from hurting your kid? I didn't! I couldn't! Do you want me to say he fought for her, he didn't just give her up like so much rubbish, like he must have thought Cathy gave him up? He didn't! He was just a kid, Em. You both were! She never held it against him, she never could hold anything against anyone! She was a wonderful, wonderful kid! I tried to protect her! But it was as though all my efforts were for nothing! I tried- I tried to keep her away from Kyle, but I never could! I tried! God, I tried! But he was a part of her heart, and her heart needed its other part! There was no stopping her when she was like that! I think she thought she was going to save him."

She pulled out a chair and sat down, suddenly unable to stand.

"You have no idea how much it hurt to leave her, but I had no choice! She was like my own kid, Emily! If I'd stayed, they'd have killed me, too. They made a good try of it, as it was! And then she'd have been alone, anyway!"

Emily shook her head.

"He loved you, Em; he loved you both so much! You were the family he'd always wished for. But he wasn't strong enough to hold onto you. He hadn't been able to hold onto anyone he'd cared for before, and you and Saskia were no different. It must have killed him to leave Saskia; in the short time he'd known her, they'd become the very best of friends, but we all know he was never particularly good at being anyone's friend. I'm sure he left her for only the best of intentions. I know they all believed it was to punish her for being your daughter, for your betrayal, but she never believed that. She wouldn't tell me why he left, but I'm sure she knew something of the reason. She stayed his very best friend; she kept his secret." She laughed, dropping her face into her hands.

"You should have seen her, Em, she was so much like him! So much like you both! She was always trying to win Kyle's trust, to make him feel some small affection for her. I know it wasn't to replace her father; she was trying to make him see that, inside, he was just a person, that all he had to be was a person, that he could let go of all of the crap from the past, and be a better person. I really thought, if anyone had a chance, that she did, but that's not how it turned out. She was fearless when she was set on one of her causes! If I thought you could handle it, why wouldn't I have told you all about her, Em? She was your baby!"

Missy walked over to Emily and put an arm around her. She didn't budge. "She's dead?"

Zoe shook her head. "She escaped. A couple of months before Zoe and I got our plan together. I guess she'd had it with all of their bullshit. She was so much like you both; in many ways, she was the best of you. She was caring and loyal to those she cared about; she did her very best to keep an open mind, and to see the optimism in even the bleakest situations. She was always willing to give someone another chance, if they were serious about it themselves. She really did believe in family. The problem was, family just didn't mean the same thing to her as it did to them. She was a great kid."

She sniffed. "You think you know shit, Em, but you know nothing." She picked herself up from the chair then and excused herself from their company. "I need a drink!"

Emily stood perfectly still, until she heard the front door close, then she went and sat down on the sofa in the lounge room. She didn't cry, she just stared.

Missy sat down beside her. It was just too many betrayals for one day; she understood how she felt.


	9. Chapter 9

After ten minutes of silence, Emily finally got to her feet. "I think one of us should ask him," she said blankly, "and I think it should be me. I'm not in the mood for arguments from you, or anyone else for that matter, but I need you to do something for me. I need you to go and get his beads, if you have them."

"I think they're packed away in a box somewhere," Missy said, eventually. "It'll take a while, but I think I should be able to find them. Look, Em, despite the fact that I believe Zoe when she says she's your friend, I don't believe she's on the right track here. So you may have known Lyle for a couple of years way back whenever, but do you really think that matters now? You've gone your separate ways. I really think it's best to leave it at that, Em, I really do."

"We have a daughter," Emily said, a bit of life coming back into her voice.

"Who may well be dead, for all we know," Missy pointed out.

"I _want_ to know!" Emily told her. "I want to know for certain!"

Missy sighed heavily. "You have no idea what they might have done to her in that place, Emily. As it is, you can't even remember her. If, _if_ there's even some slim chance of meeting her, if she's alive and there's that chance, _how_ do you think she's going to feel when she finds out that you've forgotten her! And, trust me, hon, she _will_ find out. Don't forget, she's an Empath."

Emily crossed her arms. "I need to know," she said. "And… and if she is… if we do get to meet, I think she'll be happier for it, she'll be happy to know that she still has family, and that she has a brother and a sister."

Missy looked away to the window. She didn't say, _And Reagan?_ but she was thinking it. How happy would she be to know that one of her brothers was dead? No shit, she thought, if Lyle really had been the Mysterious Healer, then Reagan would have been alive and breathing, not dead and buried in the ground like so much rubbish, as Zoe had put it!

* * *

"By the way," Missy told her, before she walked out the door to go home and start packing, "Sydney wouldn't have known if Lyle and you had had Convergence anyway; he'd never even met you."

"I don't remember," Emily said. "Who knows?"

Missy shut the door after her. She'd have to go and have a look for her brother's creepy bracelet, she supposed. Somehow, she didn't think Sydney had ever even been to the Canadian facility, so it was highly unlikely that he'd have met Emily all those years ago; Emily was forgetting – or she'd never been told – that it was in Canada that Jacob had got his start, and the glowing recommendation that had gotten both Sydney and he their jobs at Blue Cove. It had also got him killed, in the end, she knew, too. Perhaps Sydney hadn't clued onto the fact yet, but there were a couple of things that Canada hadn't told Jacob about, like some of the inoculations they'd given him, and the fact that they weren't inoculations. More specifically, that one or two of them had been a serum that, in its later stages, had gone on to become a very dangerous drug that, if a Healer was to come into contact with a person injected with the drug and attempt to Heal them, would seriously put them out of action, and, if they persisted, could even kill them.

That, more than anything, was the reason Jacob had died, she thought. Not because of the plan to save the children, not because he'd placed his trust wrongly in Catherine, who'd placed her trust wrongly in William, but because, a good Healer or not, William just hadn't been _that_ good of a Healer, because he just hadn't been in a position to risk his life to save Jacob's when, more than likely, his efforts would have been for nothing, anyway.

That was just the way it was when you came to work for a corporation like the Center, she thought. You ceased to be a person and became just another commodity, as expendable as the next.

* * *

It had taken her long enough, but she'd finally found her brother's stupid bracelet and made it to the door – someone had been knocking – and reached over for the doorhandle, expecting to see Emily standing on her doorstep.

When she saw who _was_ standing on her doorstep, she had to restrain herself from slamming the door again.

So Alex's little Healer had gotten back to him already!

She wanted to laugh. He'd better not be hoping she was going to invite him in for dinner, that was for sure! "Get inside before someone sees you!" she snapped, thinking that one or two of her female neighbours would dearly love to tell Jarod how she'd been having other men over when he was away.

When Alex didn't hurry up about it, she grabbed his arm and pulled him inside, slamming the door after him. She'd just noticed that he was staring at her in a rather unsavoury way, in a way that gave her the creepy-crawlies.

"Somethin' to say?" she growled, and he returned his attention to her face; she just realised he'd been staring at her wrist, where she was wearing the extremely creepy bracelet she'd just spent too long looking for.

"How did things go with Jolene?"

"What, she didn't tell you?" Missy snapped sarcastically.

"I haven't spoken to her, no," he replied.

"Hmm, too bad!" She laughed, then said, of the bracelet he'd been so fascinated with earlier, "It's not mine. Emily wanted it. It's my crappy _ex_-twin's. Don't ask me what she wants with it, I didn't ask, and I don't intend to. I hope she sends the thing on a one way trip to Hell, personally! Where my crappy ex-twin is!"

"That is, if you believe that Lyle was your twin," Alex replied casually, glancing around the hallway and heading off in the direction of the kitchen.

"Excuse me, loony?"

"Not everyone did," he said, then turned to face her. "Jarod and yourself are married?"

She made a face. "Tell me when any of this shit becomes any of your business, psychopath, hmmm!"

"I'll take that as affirmation," Alex said.

"You psycho!" She held up her left hand. "Wedding ring! Satisfied?"

"Shannen is upset that I lied to her."

Missy put her hand down, somewhat confused. Like she even _wanted_ to know that shit! "You didn't forget to tell her you're a compulsive liar, did you?" she asked, not one bit jokingly.

"I believe it came up, somewhere along the lines."

"Maybe she thought you were being cute, not serious," Missy replied, trying not to pull a face at that thought.

"Cute?" Alex asked.

Missy rolled her eyes. "Forget it, genius." She sighed, looking around her kitchen for something to do. "So, your kid's cute," she said, after a while, walking over and shutting the fridge door. "The Paz is hubby's, not mine," she said slowly, as though talking to a child. "You know he's addicted to anything that's three-lettered and contains the letters _p_ and _z_. _Oh, right, of course you're right, Missy, I seem to remember he likes Pez, too! Though, mind you, I thought you would have set him on a more healthy line of consumption…_" She laughed.

Alex stared at her strangely, which she didn't particularly like. He was the crazy one; he should have been staring at himself like that – not her!

"You're such a wonderful influence on me!" she chimed sweetly.

"I'm sure," he replied.

She sighed. "Murdered anyone of interest lately?" she asked casually.

"I'd tell you, but I'm not really in the business of keeping record."

She laughed falsely and put her hand up to wave. "It's about time you rejoined the mother ship, don't you think? It's getting late."

"I rather think that it would be wisest of me to wait for Shannen to contact me before I go making a nuisance of myself."

"You're kidding me!" Missy replied, all shocked and appalled. "What have you done with my Alex, you weirdo?"

"Mmm-hmm."

"For those of us who _don't_ speak Vague and Savage?"

Alex shook his head; he'd let that one go, it was probably best, in any case, he didn't want her thinking he was interested. She was a strange woman, after all. His mother always told him to watch out for strange women. Mind, not that she'd ever told him to watch out for herself, he thought. His strangeness had had to have come from somewhere, and he was betting it was from her.

"The point, I think, is that neither you nor I- Well, I should amend, in the event that the case is to change-"

"Huh?" Missy interrupted. "The point," she snapped her fingers, "quickly!"

"You're not convinced that Lyle was your twin, are you?"

"No," she cooed, "Kyle was really my-" She coughed. "Uuu-hmmm! I should watch my mouth, shouldn't I?"

"I'll take your word for it," Alex replied calmly.

"So, you have your suspicions," she summarised, widening her eyes for effect, "but you're not willing to commit?"

"That would be about the extent of the situation," he agreed.

"How like a man!"

"I believe the proper expression is, 'You can talk,'" Alex said.

She laughed. "Shut up! Seriously, Kyle must have had more going for him than any of us estimated! He put up with you, didn't he?"

"How many more times are you going to mention Kyle this evening, if I may ask?"

She tossed her head noncommittally. "We'll see." With an exaggerated sigh, and an obviously contrived thoughtfulness, she said, "The point, I think, is what you're really getting at behind all of this talk of suspicions. Perhaps you have your own suspicions about the identity of my real twin, and you're just not saying because, let's face it, you're a little creep and you find all of this human shit so fucking hilarious, it's not even _funny_!"

"Your twin is dead," Alex said, completely unemotionally.

"What?"

"It was all that long ago, I doubt you can even recall ever feeling when anything changed."

"What?" she growled, a nasty look in her eye.

"Your twin, your _real_ twin, went by the name Noah. He is dead. He has been dead for over half a century. I believe you are well enough informed of the details that I am not required to explain them to you."

She glared at him. Right at that moment, she actually really, really wanted to kill him. She could picture herself taking out the kitchen knife and cutting his stupid, little throat, though she knew she'd never make it to the throat-cutting part anyway. Alex might have been a weirdo, but she very much doubted that he was a suicidal weirdo. She'd have to see how he felt after she'd mentioned Kyle a couple more half dozen times.

She settled for laughing in his face. "You really are a lunatic, you know that!"

"It's all documented," he said plainly.

She managed a mocking, "Ha-ha," but not much else. After a few moments, she said, "Noah was a Pretender!" but even she didn't know why she'd said it. So was she, as it turned out – a point for Alex.

"I think you'll find yourself mistaken, on that point," Alex replied levelly. "He was, in fact, an Empath. A Pretender would not have survived the upgrading process."

"What the fuck?" she exploded. There went Alex's theory! If he'd really been as precious as they'd all been led to believe then they'd not have risked upgrading him only to leave him with a shelf life of less than eight years! "I don't think so, you crazy son-of-a-bitch! In case you haven't heard, upgrading kills you – _dead_ – in five years, eight tops!"

"I have heard," Alex agreed. "But, I am afraid, your brother never got to that point. He merely could not handle being taken out of his controlled environment; it was too much. Fifty-two people did not all up and decide to, shall we say, commit suicide all at once, by identical means. That was the negative feedback. It would have killed him, so he had to project it elsewhere. Unfortunately, 52 people were also elsewhere at the same time. As they say, 'my bad.' I'm supposing here, that that wasn't an entirely pleasurable feeling for him, and he decided that perhaps killing so many people had been a bad thing, a mistake, and that he shouldn't let it go on. Again, unfortunately, the only place for the negative feedback to go, if not elsewhere, was exactly where it was intended. I am sure your brother died exactly the same way that those 52 people did. It wouldn't have taken very long at all; perhaps, it wasn't even very painful."

"I fucking hate you!" Missy growled venomously.

"I don't doubt that you do," Alex replied, merely. After a moment's thought, he added, "I think you will find, however, that that bracelet, quite a many years ago, also belonged to Noah."

Missy ripped the bracelet from her wrist and threw it across the room. It hit the window and landed on the draining board beside the kitchen sink.

"Which begs the question, one would think, as to how it came to be in the possession of… Bobby."

Missy turned on him with hate-filled eyes. "What did you fucking say?" she spat.

"I highly doubt that it was… let us just pose the scenario… Raines who gave it to him, for a birthday present or some such."

"What?" Missy repeated, in a menacingly growl.

Alex put a hand out and patted her shoulder. "Never fear, we'll get to the bottom of the matter in time."

She slapped his hand away, glaring at him. "Bobby had my twin's bracelet?" she demanded.

"Yes. He's wearing it in a photograph with his adoptive mother that was printed in a local newspaper in 1964."

"How do you fucking even know he's adopted, moron?" she growled. "If he's not my fucking twin, then did it ever occur to you that maybe, just fucking maybe, he's their actual fucking son!"

"Not for a second," Alex assured her. "You see, I do believe that the two of you are, indeed, related." He took his smart phone out of his coat – Missy strongly wanted to grab it and throw it to the floor and jump up and down on it – and flipped through several menus before turning it around to show her a digital copy of the picture from the newspaper. The little boy standing beside Elsie Bowman, for all intents and purposes, might as well have been her, had he not, of course, been a boy, and his hair had not been curly.

She took a sharp step away from Alex, and the smart phone.

"Perhaps our William was not as dim-witted as he made out, hmmm?" Alex suggested. "He did, for many, many years, conceal the truth of his identity from not only his family and friends, or co-workers, but also the Tower."

"You knew he was a Healer?" Missy shot.

"Yes," Alex replied seriously. "That, I had clued onto."

"And you said nothing."

"It was in the best interests of my family for his secret to remain hidden and for the activities associated with that secret to remain so, also."

"Family?" Missy laughed.

"Yes, family."

"I didn't think you knew the meaning of the word," she said.

"Well, isn't it a funny world, sometimes? There's something we tentatively have in common, Miss Parker."

She dropped the open hostility. "So, what are you thinking on the… Bobby thing?" she asked, finally.

"In actual fact, right now, hmmm, very little of immediate interest to yourself."

"You're going to learn to speak Human one day, aren't you?"

"One day," he replied casually.

A sudden thought struck her, compelling her to say something, though it probably wasn't the best thought to air. "Tell me this 'in actual fact, right now' doesn't involve Shannen Cleary!"

"Not at all," he replied. "Need I further remind you of your own words, just a short while earlier, in fact. I am, as we're both well aware, quite the liar."

"Uck! Stop talking! Right now!"

Alex shrugged. Was he saying anything?

"Let me get this straight," she said unbelievingly, "you think Lyle was Noah?"

Alex nodded. "That'd be the gist of it, yes."

"You creep."

"Much appreciated."

"Did I ask for a running commentary on my, might I add, inventive terms of… reference?"

"You had that look, as they say."

"You're a shit! You're a real shit! You know, I think I'm finally starting to get why your mother sent you away."

"In fact, I believe it was on account of her very great pleasure at my having disposed of, shall we say, my older sister. I do believe she was quite fond of Lacey, in her own undeliberated way."

Missy waved a hand at him. "Forget it! I'm trying to stir you up here, and you reply with that shit! I think I could have done without, in honesty."

"Well, I was quite looking forward to sharing it with you actually," Alex told her, and she stared at him, trying to decide if he was having a bar of her, or not. "I should be going, I suppose," he said finally. "Your mother-in-law will be returning shortly with the children, one should think. It's getting close to dinnertime. The children will need to be fed."

"I'll just put them out on the front lawn," Missy joked.

Alex sighed and took out a blank business card, which he passed her, along with a pen.

"And what am I supposed to do with this?" she asked.

"Write down the number I give you."

She made a face, and got ready to write down the number when he gave it to her, which, as it turned out, was a cell phone number. She passed him back his pen, rolling her eyes. "Oh, I am good! Law school wasn't wasted on me after all, surprise, surprise!"

"It appears not," Alex replied. "I'll show myself out, if you don't mind."

"No, Alex, I don't fucking mind – so long as you hurry up about it!" she told him. "Don't make me turf you out!"

After a moment, she followed him out into the hall. "Get her something nice and say you're sorry," she advised. "You can pretend, can't you?"

* * *

So, she thought, as she crossed her kitchen and stared at the bracelet sitting innocuously on her shiny, metal draining board, Alex's theory was that Raines had brought her brother back from the brink of death, shuttled him off to live with the Bowmans, and, a couple of years later, recruited him as his successor in his lunacy. All in all, she thought, a lovely, comforting, warming situation.

And completely ridiculous!

She was starting to get jack of hearing of Raines's propensity for Healing people's mushy brains – and, excuse me, how he'd even been around to _Heal _her brother when he'd been hanging out in the middle of the Center's African branch!

A slow smile crept onto her face. Of course, it would make perfect sense if he'd been the one kidnapping the kid! The imperfect sense was the part where – cough, cough – he'd been the one to send him to Africa in the first place, only to change his mind a couple of years down the track and hurry off to fetch him back.

_Oh, maybe it was because you thought he was your son_, she thought to herself, _you poor baby._

_Or maybe it was because you hadn't the facilities nor the knowledge to do what you'd seen as needing to be done – so you'd quietly let them do all the hard work whilst you'd plotted how best to steal their precious little toy right back off them, you creepy maniac!_

She swiped the bracelet off the draining board and slipped it back onto her wrist. She'd have to have it ready for when Em turned up.

From her pocket, her cell phone chirped sharply. She flipped it open and clicked on the button to view the message that had been left for her from Margaret. _Taken the kids out to dinner_, the message read. _Hope that's OK. Will have them safely back in time for bed. M_

Snapping her phone shut, she turned away from the kitchen window, her thoughts occupied troublingly by the question of whether or not Raines had suspected that her brother may have been the mystery Healer, and whether or not, her brother was, in fact, the mystery Healer, or even her brother.

* * *

The clock on the wall told her it was nearly seven when Emily finally showed. She'd dropped by some fast-food place for hamburgers and chips on her way over and immediately set herself to taking out plates and cutlery for them.

"Any luck?"

Missy held up her wrist, turning it from side to side to showcase that she had had quite a bit of luck, actually, though, in the end, she thought, it had come down to good old fashioned detective work more than it had to Lady Luck.

"Great!" Emily chimed, handing her her hamburger, already served up onto a plate.

"The plates are a tad superfluous, don't you think? I'm guessing you got Margaret's message, too?"

"The plates are so the table doesn't get messy, they're not superfluous. I got mom's message, yep. Well, you know, if she has the money to take four kids out for tea, not to mention, the patience, good luck!"

Missy shrugged. She had Harm and Charles with her; maybe they'd even invited Zoe, of the angel believers.

She took a bite of her hamburger, glad that it was from somewhere other than the creed of McDonald's or Burger King.

"There is a flaw in this plan of yours, you know?" she said, after a while.

"Nope," Emily replied. "Hit me."

"How are you going to find Lyle in the first place to ask him if he's some wow-O Healer?"

"He sent me a cheap postcard saying I was free to write back to him if I ever wanted someone to talk to," she replied casually.

"My goodness, my brother can write!" Missy joked.

Emily laughed. "After a fashion. He must have been having a good day, though, forgot that stamps aren't free! Cheapskate!"

"How do you know it's not just a post box?"

"It doesn't say it is. I checked it out on the web."

"I see. Is it expensive?"

"I don't know. Probably not so much. He's supposed to be _a kid_." She grinned. "It must totally kill him, I know!"

"You never know!" Missy told her. "The place he lived in a couple of years back, I heard from Cox his neighbour had the habit of commandeering other people's bins."

Emily laughed. "What?"

"Don't ask me! Cox is strrrrrrrrrange! Maybe he made it up. You know, he had to show Lyle up at that, too! My ep on Cleary's show had more repeats than yours; my neighbours don't steal my bins, they just name their anti-child molesters groups after me! Go me!"

Emily shook her head. "That's totally creepy, you realise," she told her.

Missy shrugged. "The total truth! K.O.K.S.: Keep Our Kids Safe."

Emily laughed. "Oh my God!"

"You know what Lyle's would have been: People Aren't Really Complacent About Reading. Suck it, farmer boy!"

"You're mean," Emily told her, smiling.

"Affectionate," Missy joked with a smile, nodding. "You'll take my gun, won't you?"

"Just in case."

Missy nodded again. "Better safe than sorry. You know that's what they always say."

"You're okay to take the kids for a couple of days, aren't you?" Emily asked, on a serious note.

"Of course."

"Thanks."

"It's alright, no thanks needed. We're family, Em. Family stick together."

Emily smiled.


	10. Chapter 10

Missy had just finished taking the rubbish out to the garbage bin when she nearly leapt onto the bin, and shot a death glare at the person standing beside her. He was really getting to be too much! Next he was going to be asking if he could move in, or something. "If you ever creep up on me like that again, I will totally kill you and stuff you in this bin!" she told him, smacking her hand down on the bin lid.

"A comforting thought," Alex replied, starting to annoy her with his frown.

"Would you quit with the look already," she snapped. "You're giving me a headache. You are aware that my kids are going to be home soon. My mother- and father-in-law are dropping them off."

"I was thinking-"

"Spit it out, already!"

"You are able to contact Jarod, are you not?"

She snickered and decided it best not to make some sarcastic quip that would just be lost on Alex who hadn't quite mastered the art of human interaction: Cleary was one strange woman, that was all there was to be said of the subject. Or maybe she was a T-Corp infiltrator, Missy thought. Personally, she liked the irony in that.

She looked down at her slippers, hard to make out by the light coming from the front of the house, but visible all the same, and sighed. She'd thought of something that might give her a laugh, and which wasn't offensive, after all. "I'm afraid I'm not wearing my sparkly, red shoes, Alex. I wouldn't have a clue how to contact Jarod without them! They're my lifeline! I can't do that thing that Samantha does with her nose and- Just like magic!"

Alex put a hand on her arm and steered her in the direction of her front door. "I think it would be best if we discussed this inside," he told her.

"Yes, of course, you never know the types that might be listening in from their clever, little hiding spots in the bushes!"

"Have you been drinking?"

She choked. "You jerk!"

"Oo, she's back!"

"Piss off! Stop touching my arm, it might hit you!"

"That'd be more than Shannen's willing to commit, at this moment."

"What did you do?"

"I apologised, as you advised that I do."

"And?"

"And she threatened, from the other side of the door, to phone the police to arrive and have me removed if I did not swiftly remove myself; apparently, her daughter was trying to sleep!"

"That's too bad," Missy told him. "It really is."

"Your sincerity continues to astound, might I impart, madam."

"Why, thank you, sir," she replied sarcastically, playing it up. "And, yes, you may." She rubbed her fingers over her cheekbone. "Coffee's not out of the question on your menu card, is it?"

"Coffee will do finely, thank you, Miss Parker."

She nodded. "I never did find out the name of that handler of yours," she told him.

"Phillip."

"Good old Phil, eh? Milk and sugar?"

"No."

She took the electric kettle to the sink to fill it with water. "You've never stopped and thought, _Hang on, what _on Earth_ is Cleary doing with me?_"

"I was led to believe that the choice was Shannen's as to whom she was to romantically involve herself with," Alex replied.

"Partly," Missy nodded. "Of course, the other half of that choice is yours, you know. Thing is, though, it's highly unlikely you're the only choice that's open to her. Even now. So what is she doing with you, Alex? You're sure this wasn't set up by Barb? You're completely sure 'famous' and 'in the public eye' isn't just a superficial distraction, a weak varnish suggesting she can't have had a hand in the goings on?"

"I fail to see the point in such actions," Alex said.

"Control, Alex, that's the point."

Alex sighed.

"What's happening?"

Alex tossed his head; it was nothing that suffered to be spoken aloud.

"Don't you see what she's doing? It's all starting now. 'My daughter.' Not 'our daughter.' Separation, refusal to visitation, then it's _Bye-bye, baby_ and _Welcome to Project Pretender_ and _The Lab-rat Life_!"

"You are simply making this out to a bigger thing than it is, Miss Parker," he replied.

"Until that's exactly what happens," she told him, switching the kettle on to boil.

"Coco is not a Pretender," Alex voiced.

"I had gathered. Still, you think that's going to matter to your mother? She will insist that it is in the child, despite all evidence, and that'll be that. What's more, with darling Coco gone from the picture, Cleary will get exactly what she's always been hankering after – one super-sized pity trip!"

"She is just not like that. You have her all wrong."

Missy fixed him with a serious stare. "And you would fucking know, Alex! You've known so many women, have you? 'Romantically'?"

"I am not an idiot."

Missy shook her head. "Forget it, Alex, I'm talking about something that goes deeper than just being good at math or regurgitating theories on physics or logic or… What does it even matter? Whether you want to believe it or not, Alex, this isn't just some simulation, this is the real world. And it can be… unbearably complicated and, at the same time, so fucking simple it's downright laughable! Reading about this shit in a book's not going to do you any good, in fact, it's likelier to fuck you over than to offer you an ounce of sound advice. You have to figure out the best way to navigate this shit for yourself, and the only way to do that is by getting hurt, over and over again, until you learn to pick the types who are likely to hurt you from those that aren't, and steer clear of the painful ones. The rest… you might as well take the word of some proverb you got off the back of a sachet of sugar or out of a fortune cookie.

Hit me with it! What's old Phil up to these days? Looking for a fresh, new face? Perhaps a little change of attitude, a different brand of quality comedic viewing? A female? Name of Coco, anyone?"

"Stop it," Alex told her firmly.

"So sue me, psycho!" she snapped. Complacency might have been his best bud when it came to emotions and little kids, but it wasn't hers! "If you aren't going to get to the bottom of that bitch's game plan, than I am! I'm not going to let that kid go the way of Jarod and Kyle! Yeah, you remember Kyle, don't you?"

Alex stood up.

Missy pointed a finger at him. "You look out for that kid, Alex! If anything happens to her, I'm holding you personally responsible! You're her father – that shit means something, shock horror!"

"Good evening, madam," he said stiffly.

She showed him her finger, and turned back to the kettle. He had better believe that she meant what she said! "Fuck you, too!" she shouted after him.

"Excuse me?" Margaret replied, stepping into the kitchen. "Who was that?"

Missy's hand slipped from the counter. _Shit!_

* * *

"John."

"John who?"

"John I-don't-know."

Margaret sighed. "Missy, what is going on? Where has Emily gone at this hour that she's had to leave me a text message telling me to drop the kids off with you?"

Missy shook her head, thinking fast. "She just needed some time alone, I guess. To get her head around some emotional problems she's been having."

"Well, funny this is the first I'm hearing of these emotional problems, don't you think?" Margaret replied. "John who?"

"I don't know," Missy repeated.

"You don't know, but you invited him into your house? What's more, when your husband and children were away?"

Missy laughed, and slipped past her into the hall. She'd like to see her kids now, thank you.

The kids were sitting in the lounge room with Zoe; through the window, Missy could see Charles talking with Alex and felt her heart leap in panic. _Shit, shit, shit!_

She hurried over to the twins and hugged them each. Snow was watching her too closely for comfort. _Please understand_, she thought. Farfalla had fallen asleep in Zoe's arms, it looked like.

Missy nodded and told her quietly that she'd do best to take her upstairs – the guestroom would work – and Zoe left with a sleeping Farfalla.

Snow watched Zoe leave with his little sister, then returned his gaze to Missy. She'd already taken Kit and Whitney's hands and was leading them toward the lounge room door. Snow stayed sitting on the sofa.

* * *

Walking back to the kitchen, Missy noticed that Charles – or maybe Margaret – had invited Alex back inside to talk, and that Harmony had on quite the scowl and Margaret had on her own sour expression. Amidst all of this, Snow was sitting at the kitchen table, sipping a glass of cordial. Zoe stood by the fridge, arms crossed over her chest.

Missy made her way over to Alex and took his arm. "I think it's time John was headed home – to his wife and daughter!" she said loudly, shooting Margaret a glare. What right did she have interrogating her friends?

Charles put his hand up. "Hang on, Missy."

"You are not my father!" Missy told him coldly, turning her glare on him.

Alex put his hand over hers. "He's worried for you, Missy," he said carefully. "He's not trying to be your father, or control you. He doesn't want to see you get hurt. I think you should have a little more regard for that, don't you? Other people do have feelings, too, Missy, and I know that you're capable of understanding that, I am by no means insinuating that you aren't a feeling person yourself, I'm saying think it through before you jump to conclusions about people's motivations. The past is the past, Missy. Right now, no-one is trying to h-"

Missy let go of his arm in disgust and slapped him across the face. "I have fucking had it up to _here_ with your shit!" she screamed. "GET OUT OF MY FUCKING HOUSE!" With that, she grabbed his arm and dragged him to the door with her. "I SAID, 'OUT!'"

Zoe ran a hand over her hair; this didn't look good.

Snow stood up and walked over to the door. "Aunt Missy."

"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT, YOU!" Missy snapped. She pushed Alex away from her, in the direction of the front door. "SHANNEN MIGHTN'T HAVE THE FUCKING GUTS TO CALL THE COPS BUT, _TRUST ME_, I AM NOT SOME STUPID, BLONDE BARBIE-FIED BITCH! YOU'VE GOT EXACTLY TWO FUCKING SECONDS!" She took out her cell phone and started dialling. She only shut her phone when she saw the front door close. Then she turned and walked back to the kitchen.

"Party's over!" she told them all, her voice wavering. "Get the fuck out of my house!"

Zoe pushed herself away from the fridge and stopped beside Charles to whisper something to him in a low voice. He shot a glance in Margaret's direction, and nodded, walking over to join her and picked up her hand. "She'll work it out of her system," he said quietly.

Margaret laughed darkly, and let Charles lead her out of the room, turning back to watch Missy until she'd walked too far along the hall to see her anymore.

Zoe followed them out.

Harmony didn't budge.

"Go, mom!" Missy snapped, storming up to her and pointing to the kitchen door.

"Why should I?" Harmony asked, completely at ease. "I'm your mother. You may want to talk to me later, and I won't be around."

"Go!"

"No, Missy, I think I'll stay," Harmony decided.

"GET OUT!" Missy hollered.

Snow stood in the doorway, staring at her with wide eyes.

She turned abruptly and glared at him with her coldest, darkest glare. What was he fucking looking at her like that for, with her fucking loser brother's eyes? If he didn't cut it the fuck out, she'd fucking slap him too! She'd had enough! Wasn't she allowed to be human, too!

A trickle of blood ran into his mouth.

There wasn't enough time for either Missy or Harmony to move forward and catch him before he collapsed.

"What are you doing?" Alex asked, staring at her as though, just possibly, she'd gone mad.

Missy's thoughts were too slow. She was caught somewhere between horror at her actions and relief that someone had stepped in to catch Snow, that it was taking longer than usual for her to work up an anger over the fact that Alex was back in her house again – when she'd just thrown him out, no less.

The Center might have been believed that he was a Pretender, and that intelligent it wasn't funny, but, right now, she thought, he had no sense at all. He didn't need to stir up Harmony into asking more questions.

She said nothing, though, she was thinking that she wasn't really in any position to speak out against the look he was now giving her. She'd just… lost it, for a little while. She realised, then, that her legs were shaking. She'd scared herself that thoroughly – because this wasn't just some headache, it wasn't too long spent training herself in her Inner Sense abilities, this was the realm of Reapers and angry beings from the other side, if one was to buy those tales. And completely, entirely real.

Her breathing wasn't right, sort of strange. She lurched forward. She… she needed to know Snow was alright, she hadn't hurt him too badly. She could feel her eyes prickling as though asking her permission, but she didn't want to cry.

She was too old now, she told herself, to lose it like she just had. She should have… just walked away.

_It's MY house!_ she thought angrily.

And that was when the tears started.

* * *

So, she was crying in front of the two people in all the world she wanted least to cry in front of – the woman who said she was her mother, though she had no memory of ever being so, the woman she couldn't let go of her anger at despite all of her efforts, and the man she'd thought she'd never have to think about again after he'd died.

She was standing in the kitchen, staring out the kitchen window into the street, wrapped tightly in night-time, wishing Jarod were with her. She always felt better when he was around.

Worse, was Harmony's eyes fixed on her. Now, not even Snow was around to distract her attention – he'd been taken to her bedroom to sleep. When she'd checked it, his pulse had seemed fine; she'd been reluctant to take anything Alex said for serious.

For a long moment, she wondered what she was waiting for.

She was startled back to reality when Harmony walked over and placed the tissue box on the draining board beside where she was standing at the sink.

She sniffed, but didn't take a tissue. As though she hadn't guessed the reason for Snow's sudden faint, Harmony had had no words of outrage for her. Or perhaps Harmony really had no idea. The thought offered no comfort for her. Snow was Emily's son as well as her brother's, and Em was her sister-in-law and friend. What was more, Snow had never ever done a single thing to cause her to want to hurt him the way she had.

She could see it already, the trust she'd built up between them would be as though washed away in the tide, when he finally woke up. It would never be the same between them. Perhaps, even, he'd give up piano lessons; perhaps he'd be too frightened to ever trust her again.

But thinking the thoughts that she was only gave her tears more reason to flow. She needed to change her line of thoughts, she needed to stop crying.

She turned away from the sink and walked to the table, stepping past Harmony, and stopped in front of Alex. She rested her head on his shoulder and whispered, "I don't want to be that person." She could hardly bring herself to care what Harmony might be thinking. How could Harmony understand that there was a part of her – like there was a part of Alex – that just refused to believe everything that it had been told, that just wanted to be a person, and not a machine, not something driven to think and feel only in regards to itself.

Without having to be told, she knew that whatever amoral things Alex had done in his life, that he hadn't killed his sister. She hadn't needed to ask – When was it? What were the circumstances under which the young woman died? – because she already knew the answer. Perhaps, a part of her had always known it would be something like this. In fact, Sydney had told her the story two or three years ago. Even over the phone, she hadn't believed it. She knew that the reason that Alex had found it so hard to give up on the idea that one day, maybe one day he'd finally have the chance to be someone real, was because of that young woman, because he really had loved her, because he really had been hurt when she'd died, but because he had convinced himself that in killing her he must not have loved her, must not have been hurt by her death, that he must not have been like other people, 'normal' people, it had been incredibly hard to understand that, underneath all of the garbage that he'd allowed to be put into his head over the years, he was just a person. Underneath all of that, he'd wanted to be a good person, a real person, for her.

She had tried to save him from all that, Missy knew, she just hadn't made it, she'd failed. That such a small moment could grow to encompass so much in its wake might have seemed funny, at times, she thought; sometimes, indeed, she was able to laugh about it, but, right now, she was crying.

Her mother, her _real_ mother, had tried to save her once, too. Now, she couldn't remember that woman.

Catherine might have had her ups and downs, she might have had her good days and her bad, but she'd decided that she would never, ever give up.

Missy missed her mother.

"Don't you think it's time we got that last name?" Harmony asked Alex.

"John is my contact on the inside," Missy told her mother. "He works for the Center." She heard the kettle click off. So someone had remembered the coffee, after all.

Without saying anything, Harmony walked over to the kettle.

"I think I'll go and check on Snow," Missy said.

* * *

Missy sat down on the side of her bed. For a few minutes, she sat in the dark, just watching her nephew sleep. Perhaps he'd be alright, she thought. Perhaps he wouldn't even remember what had happened.

She placed a hand on his head for a brief moment, and stood. She knew it wasn't the right thing to hope for, but she really hoped he wouldn't remember. She really needed that second chance.

She left the door ajar and walked back to the kitchen.

"I continue to fail to see the point," Harmony was saying to Alex, when she entered the kitchen.

"The point, Harmony, is that I need to know what those lunatics are thinking," she said. "Perhaps you are unaware, but my husband just so happens to be at the centre of an ancient prophecy of which they are avid subscribers. I can't just ignore that. The people who stand to lose most, the people whose power lies in people believing in that prophecy, whether it's bollocks or not, will stop at nothing to maintain that power – including taking matters into their own hands to see the prophecy to its full fruition. I don't trust them, and you shouldn't either. I need to be informed; I need to know how to fight these lunatics, and when to duck and run."

Harmony sighed. "I don't believe in telling the future," she said simply.

"That doesn't mean other people don't, Harmony. And, unfortunately, so long as those people continue to do so, the prophecy continues to endanger us all."

"You don't even know what the prophecy says," Harmony protested.

"I know enough to know that it involves Jarod and, quite possibly, even me."

"That's all just supposition!"

"The scroll that was recovered from Carthis was not that containing the true prophecy," Alex interrupted calmly. "The Tower will have kept the truth of that particular article to themselves. Whether one is to believe in telling the future or not, is of very little relevance. The Center may have begun the way that you have been told, Missy, but the Tower most certainly did not. They are much older than the Center. Their name derives from that of the Tower of London, in fact. If the Tower had not stepped in as protectorate to the Center when it was still in its early stages, I doubt that it would have gotten very far at all. It was a clever move on behalf of the Tower, and some people would think that it was the right move for the Center to take. Just remember, the Tower have their own agenda altogether, and it may not align with that which we have been told time and again that the Center strives for. They are a very different entity, as much as we have all been led to believe otherwise. It is merely an extension of the same game they've been playing for hundreds of years."

"The Tower of London?" Somehow, Missy found that too farfetched to buy into.

"Tower One, yes."

"Tower One was housed in the Tower of London?" Missy asked quickly. Granville, Kyle's first and former handler, had been reputed to have been employed under Tower One.

"Yes."

"That must have been a long time ago?"

"It was, yes."

"Granville-"

"I am aware of the matter at which you are getting."

"He's-"

"She is. Granville is a woman, I think you will find."

"A woman?"

"Yes."

"What is she? A Reaper? A Healer?"

"Who can say? Perhaps neither."

"I do sometimes still wonder what happened to… _her_… when Blue Cove went out of business."

"Naturally, one would."

"I never dealt in Triumvirate law, so I was never really compelled to delve into the Tower's history so deeply."

"It has not been a kindness on their behalf, the process of furthering themselves to the extent that they have achieved over the years, by any means or stretch of the imagination," Alex replied.

"I guess my brother would have known a bit about the Tower seeing as he dealt with quite a few of their biggest rivals."

"Quite a bit, yes."

"If he weren't dead, I'd be slightly worried."

"Well, he always was a bit of a worry, that one," Alex agreed. "Look, Missy, if I can be forward with you, I'd like to say that the reason the Tower did not take my advice was not because they did not believe me, but because they had come to the conclusion that by making certain allowances they would, effectively, be able to circumnavigate your father's interference in their plans for you. He had, undoubtedly, had his own plans for you, which, unfortunately, had clashed with their own. The problem became simple, then. How to allow him to continue thinking that he had won your particular case when, in fact, he had not? That is the simple truth of it. The truth, of course, though it at first appears simple, is much more complicated than that, and perhaps it is not a constant thing, perhaps it is changing much more than we know, but the simple truth is: they knew. One way or another, they would have seen to it that you were trained to best utilise certain elements of your abilities. I think that makes quite a strong case for your importance to them, do you not agree? That, perhaps, you are also a part of their prophecy?"

Missy sighed. "The thought fills me with so much joy!" she replied sarcastically.

"Joy!" Harmony burst out in outrage. She wasn't filled with joy – that much was certain! "What is he talking about? Circumnavigating James's interference? What interference?"

"Daddy wasn't entirely keen on training me as a Pretender," Missy finally said. "He didn't think the particular brand of conditioning that Pretenders under the Center go through would be conducive of my handling taking over chairmanship eventually very well at all, I guess I'd have to say, to be fair. He'd worked out his own way for things to go. The Tower… they weren't really down with that, apparently."

"You were trained as a Pretender?"

"By a rival to the Center. T-Corp. But- Look, I'm alright now. I got help. I'm not going to- I'm alright."

"I don't buy that for a second, Missy," Harmony replied. "I don't think you're alright, I don't think you've been alright for a long, long time."

"I am coping," Missy rephrased. "I'm doing my very best."

"I'm not arguing with that," Harmony said.

"Well, in that case… Besides, I wasn't aware that this had become an argument. As far as I'm concerned, it is a discussion. I would, however, prefer if we veered away from that particular discussion. My private life is my own."

Harmony did not reply. Missy supposed she may have been upset. _So what_, she thought. So what if Harmony was her mother? Did that give her automatic right to know every detail of every moment of her life? No. In fact, it did not. That right still remained with her. And, whilst she was aware that now that the matter was out of the bag, she would have to give it some consideration and thought, and she would have to discuss it with the other members of their family, at least, in some capacity, she was also aware that they did not have a licence that said that they could ask anything and just expect her to answer as though she was… for as good an analogy as any, their digipet. She didn't bark when they said bark, or fetch when they said fetch, just as she didn't roll over when they said roll over, and she wasn't about to start. She was going to compromise – that was not negotiable – but the extent of the negotiation still lay with her. They'd just have to decide if they would take it or leave it themselves. And, if not, they'd have to sit down and have a think about their next move.

She sighed. "Look, I think it's about time John was getting home and, frankly, it's about time you were, too. We will talk about this some other time. And, if you're going to stay, let me just tell you right off, I'm tired, I want to sleep, that's it, that's the deal. If you're going to stay, let me sleep. I can't think when I'm tired, and I'm not going to be able to string two coherent words together when I'm strung out due to lack of sleep, either." She got to her feet. "Goodnight, John. I wish you a pleasant evening, but I'm afraid that it's time to go, now."

* * *

Harmony watched her closely as she closed the door after Alex, but didn't speak right away. Missy decided to get there first. "Tomorrow," she said. "We sit down and figure out how to get all of us together so we can talk about this. Right now, I am going to pour myself a glass of water and go to bed. Goodnight, mom." And, with that, she walked back to the kitchen, leaving Harmony standing in the hall by the front door.

* * *

In a way, she'd known it had had to be put out there. Emily's secret had come out, in time, and now, it seemed, it was time for hers to surface. It had seemed, at the time, like it might have all been okay – Emily had not, after all, questioned her story other than to question the reliability of the statement of her death – but it had become clear that now that part of the story was out – though not to all of them – that the rest of it had to come out, too. She knew, also, that the others, in all likelihood, would not take it as easily as Emily had. They would not trust her completely, afterward, she wagered. They would ask questions, endless questions, and shoot her looks that said volumes without saying anything at all. The troubling thing in all of that, however, was not that it would be exactly what she was expecting, but that she had realised how unlikely it was, finally, for Emily to have been so understanding and so without question. What had really been going on in her mind? she wondered.

She might have taken out her cell phone and rung Emily, but it was late and she was tired and she didn't want to start another war, she just wanted to sleep. The problem was, her thoughts didn't seem to want to allow her even that, they just continued to race over and over endlessly, swipping and swapping too fast for her to even make sense of them.

Perhaps it was also that she wasn't accustomed to sleeping on the couch, she thought, but Harm had taken the second bed in the guestroom and Snow was sleeping in the room that she would usually have shared with Jarod.

Opening her eyes, she sat up and decided that Snow wasn't going to wake up in the middle of the night and decide to eat her – he wasn't a Reaper – and that she really wasn't in the mood for sleeping on the couch. She sat up and walked to her bedroom where Snow was still sleeping and, feeling his forehead quickly, decided that he was doing okay and moved around the bed to lie down on the other side of the mattress.

In the morning, she would feel much, much better. She'd be able to tackle things with much more ease. She was already looking forward to all the apologising that she had to do, and, at the same time, that she would still have to be standing up for herself in the other case. She was really making herself Miss Popular this week, she thought as she closed her eyes.

Well, it couldn't be helped now, she supposed. Things would look better in the morning, that was the way she'd decided they would look, and that was the way she was determined they _would_ look.

"Goodnight, Jar," she whispered.


End file.
